25% to My Book Goal

Book Tracker 05

The Digital Fundraising Blueprint
By Jeremy Haselwood

I mentioned in my last book report that I recently picked up a part time gig with the United States Association of Blind Athletes as the Program and SafeSport Coordinator. The primary duties of my job are to develop and implement Programs and to ensure we as an organization are SafeSport compliant and everyone who takes part in our Programs is SafeSport compliant. If you don’t know what all of that means, don’t worry, it basically means I help in developing the programs USABA puts on both in person and virtually and I make sure our policies align with the U.S. Center for SafeSport which makes sure athletes, coaches, volunteers, etc who are involved with the organization and Olympic/Paralympic movements follow the rules when it comes to physical and mental safety.

The reason I tell you this is because in order to create and implement good programs I need to know about fundraising, which is the nonprofit way of saying “Sales.” This book deals specifically with Fundraising in the Digital space and some strategies on how best to marry digital fundraising efforts with direct mail, and in-person events.

My first job out of college was with a Social Enterprise Nonprofit, Lighthouse Works—a subsidiary of Lighthouse Central Florida. I learned a little bit about fundraising while I was there and a little bit about how important the digital side can be. I of course have been working in the digital space for building my own brand as well as helping to reaffirm the Bubba Burger brand as well for several years. However, I wouldn’t consider myself an expert in digital marketing, advertising, sales, or fundraising. So I figured reading a short little 4.5 hour book wouldn’t hurt.

The big thing with this book was that it explained many forms of digital marketing from Search Engine Marketing, to Social Media Marketing, Email campaigns, etc. It focused a lot on explaining all the major forms of awareness, engagement and fundraising done through the digital space and how best to apply it to the nonprofit world. There was a ton of good information and I’ll probably re-read sections of this book in the months to come as I think about and begin to implement programs for USABA, especially as we continue exploring the virtual space.

One of the biggest things I liked least about this book was that the author sped read. There were not a lot of pauses for emphasis or pauses for breath before moving on to the next topic. There was a point near the beginning of the book where it sounded like a bunch of gobledy-gook as the author seemed to have recorded over himself. Seriously did this guy not do a listen through of his book? Or was that a glitch on my part. There were also a few instances where he clearly messed up reading (probably because he was reading too fast) and back tracked and re-read the sentence a couple of times. Usually I like when authors read their own work, but this guy clearly isn’t a voice actor. He just read it to have an audiobook and seemed like he was trying to cram it into 4.5 hours. He has a good voice, just slow down a bit dude and take a breath occasionally.

Like I said, this book has some good information when it comes to digital marketing and how to apply it to a nonprofit. I’ll definitely be referencing this book in the months to come.

Book Tracker: 5/20
Hey I’m already 25% of the way to my goal!