Using Prezi?

Prezi is a cloud-based alternative to PowerPoint and other presentation software. Of course you can download your Prezis for use without internet as well. If you want to learn how to use it, click here Learn About Prezi. There are 3 video tutorials that will teach you all you need to know. If you want to learn why to use Prezi or the pitfalls to avoid, read on...

Unless you are an advanced user of PowerPoint or other presentation software, your audience is potentially somewhere on the "Barney Arc of Hatred" when PPT pops up on the screen. They are so tired of seeing someone read their bullet points off of their blue background slides that they'll pull out their phones and pretend they're tweeting about you, when in fact they're checking Facebook or playing Angry Birds. Or worse, they're tweeting about you.

Prezi can shake these jaded audiences up by providing a flow of motion that is refreshingly unexpected. It's NOT about creating a synopsis or handout of your presentation. It's inherently about presenting key words, concepts and imagery to reinforce learning and memory of the concepts you present in person. It's not about making a text heavy presentation "prettier." Someone who tends to put all their content as text in their presentation and reads it to their audience, probably shouldn't use Prezi. (and, probably isn't serving their adult learners very well) However, for those speakers who use their presentations as a visual experience and memory aid to enhance learning for their audience while increasing the impact of live, interactive presentations, then Prezi can sing. 

 GoalBusters Prezi created for the AFP Los Angeles Regional Philanthropy Conference. 

Prezi can, by itself, without "you" deliver a meaningful learning experience. Use it like that if you want to create a stand alone presentation that does not need interpretation. However, that is NOT the most effective way for professional speakers to use Prezi. If you are delivering a live presentation or wish to provide support materials to someone who has been in one of your presentations, think of your Prezi as more of a visual or contextual outline with memory cues of the content you present. It has value for someone who has participated in your presentation, but does not replace "you" or allow someone to easily "borrow" your work and present it on their own.

GRIPES: A common complaint I hear is that "All that movin' around makes me sea-sick." I'd argue that if a viewer has that experience, then the Prezi may need editing for better flow. When setting "motion paths," be conscious of the fact that in western cultures we expect to read "top to bottom" and "left to right." Create your motion to accommodate these expectations, especially with bullet points and text blocks to minimize potential "motion sickness."

Also, I've heard claims that Prezi retains the copyright to your content. That is not true. Prezi does not impose, nor retain copyright. Here's a link to their policy http://prezi.com/copyright and Terms of Use http://prezi.com/terms-of-use/

In their TOS, the pertinent sections are 4.3-4.5 and 5. You can read it all, but cutting to the chase, all of this "rights to use" language is about Prezi protecting themselves from someone trying to sue them for distributing copyrighted material because the presentations are "cloud-based."

BOO! IT'S SCARY! (or maybe you're complacent) You've heard that saying "If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got. Yeah, that's a lie. Keep doing the same old tired stuff without innovation and "updates" and your effectiveness will decline. We all need to be shaken up a bit now and then don't we? So, what do you have to lose? Prezi is free, give it a try and see how your audience responds. Also see if it tugs you to rethink presentation of your work to better serve your learners. Change is good.

Happy Halloween!

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Storytelling: Communicating Your Mission with Infectious Passion

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On July 13th 2010, GoalBusters presented the webinar "Storytelling: Communicating Your Mission with Infectious Passion" for the Charity Channel's Charity University. Here are some of highlights and resource materials we discussed during the session.

Storytelling is a part of our cultural heritage and vital in any organization to transfer the passion
you have for your cause to the public, donors, volunteers, board members and staff.

Stories are important to us because:

• They communicate history
• They establish identity
  
• They share culture
• They aid memory

Universal themes will help you engage the listener so they keep listening.

Organizational Stories and Themes: Examples

	Mob at the Gates			Benevolent Community	Rot at the Top	Triumphant Individual
Examples for a Nonprofit School	Government funding being cut for education New legislation requires more time for testing and less time for other classes			Students’ families and friends get together to refurbish the auditorium for performances	Owner of property next door to school building large factory and trying to force school to move	Principal of school was once a student there and has come home to provide education for his hometown

How will you represent your organization? Most organizations have stories in each category. Which are the most compelling for your organization?

Classic Story Structure: “Introduce your hero, get him up a tree, throw rocks at him, throw more rocks at him and then get him out of the tree.” - Robert McKee, Screenwriting Guru

It's easier to convince a prospective donor to contribute if he or she can empathize with a character and be engaged by the story.

What do you need to transform your data to a story?

• Introduce Protagonist - Who are we following? It can be an individual or your organization.
• Inciting Incident - Importance of antagonism or the emotional dynamics. This is the "Problem Statement.
  
• Obstacles / Barriers - Why is it hard to fix the problem?
• Resolution / Success - Put the donor in the story

Another way to express the story is...

• Who you are
• What you do
• Why it matters
• How someone can help

Telling the Story:

• Determine your audience - Focus on who you can actually persuade to act
• Give your characters voice - Client quotes, Real people where possible
• Select communication vehicle -In person? Print? Radio? TV? Video?
• Pick presentation style - How formal do you need to be? Where will you be telling your story?
• Target desired response - What do you want them to do? Fall asleep? (bedtime story) Get angry? Volunteer? Change their mind? Give you money?
  
• Think about the epilogue and the sequel - What comes next? What will you talk about when you next meet?

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Watch the videos of the nonprofit organizations whose stories were shared today.

The Hopi Education Endowment Fund's connection of History, Identity, Memory and Culture.

The "Classic Story Structure" in the campaign to build the Sanders Clinic; Sanders, Arizona.




Meet John H. Caskey, III the protagonist of the North Country HealthCare story.




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Additional Storytelling tips and resources

Storytelling as Best Practice - Ten Tips for Storytellers by Terrence E. McNally

1. Stories are about people. (And people have names – even if you have to make them up.) Instinctively, your audience will want to know whom they will be following on this particular journey, and they also will want a mental picture of that person, so it helps to provide at least a few physical details.

2. One or more of the people in your story has to want something: to do something, to change something, to get something. A story doesn’t really get started until the audience knows what the goal is and has a reason to care whether or not it is attained.

3. Stories need to be fixed in time and space. Audiences don’t need every detail, but they want to know: was this last week or 10 years ago? Are we on a street corner in Boston, a Wal-Mart in Iowa, or somewhere else?

4. While people in a story pursue a goal, they tend to talk. Direct quotes let the audience hear your characters’ unique voices, bring the audience into action (which is precisely where you want them), and lend urgency to storytelling.

5. Audiences bore easily. Your story has to make them wonder, “What happens next?” or “How is this going to turn out?” As people in your story pursue their goal, they have to run into obstacles, surprises, or something that makes the audience sit up and take notice.

6. Stories speak the audience’s language. They are colorful (thanks to telling details), concise, and clearly understandable.

7. Stories stir up emotions. Human beings (which should comprise the majority of your audience) will not think about things they do not care about. So you have to make them care before you can get them to think about your issue. That’s the test your story has to meet.

8. Stories don’t tell: they show. Intellectually, your audience will understand a sentence such as, “She felt hostility from the family.” But when you write, “The family wouldn’t look her in the eye,” your audience will see the moment and feel the family’s anger.

9. Stories have clear meaning. When the curtain comes down, your audiences should know why exactly they took this journey with you.

10. Stories are containers of truth. At their essence, the best stories are about how we should treat ourselves, how we should treat other people, or how we should treat the world around us.

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Resources for Further Learning

Storytelling as Best Practice By Andy Goodman, available at agoodmanonline.com

Free Range Thinking A free monthly newsletter by Andy Goodman, available at agoodmanonline.com

The Triumph of Narrative by Robert Fulford “Story telling is an attempt to deal with and at least partly contain the terrifyingly haphazard quality of life.”

The Fifth Discipline by Peter Senge “I realize that…many otherwise competent managers in leadership positions were not leaders of the same ilk precisely because they saw no larger story.”

The Story Factor by Annette Simmons “In a complex environment, people listen to whomever makes the most sense – whomever tells the best story. Facts don’t have the power to change someone’s story. Your goal is to introduce a new story that will let your facts in.”

Storytelling in Organizations by Yiannis Gabriel “In [a business] environment, amidst the noisy din of facts, numbers, and images, the delicate, time-consuming discourse of storytelling is easily ignored or silenced. Few organizations are spontaneous storytelling cultures.”

Storytelling for Grantseekers: The Guide to Creative Nonprofit Fundraising by Cheryl A Clarke

All Marketers are Liars: The power of Telling Authentic Stories in a Low-Trust World by Seth Godin

Story: Substance, Structure, Style, and the Principles of Screen writing by Robert McKee

Screenplay: The Foundations of Screenwriting; a step-by-step guide from concept to finished script by Syd Field.

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Additional training and presentation information about Storytelling and other topics is available at www.GoalBusters.net or by emailing info@goalbusters.net.

Connect with GoalBusters: LinkedIn - Alice Ferris / LinkedIn - Jim Anderson / Facebook / Twitter / YouTube / Myspace

Answers to Fundraising's Persistent Questions

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We recently conducted a webinar on How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan, hosted by Stevenson, Inc. We got some good questions during the session, so we thought we'd share two of them, and our answers.

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Q: Do you have any strategies for donor acquisition during these tougher times?

Focus on donor participation, and not necessarily on size of gift. Right now we have a lot of people who are scaling back on their contributions, but are no less committed to the causes they believe in. Economic conditions may have led them to reduce their overall charitable giving budget, so if they could give $100 to a single charity last year, they may only be able to give $50 this year. They already feel sad about that—you don’t need to rub it in! Help them feel like whatever amount they can give is important.

If you have suggested dollar amounts on your solicitations, you may want to add a lower end suggested amount and drop one of your higher end levelsa

I would not, however, add premiums at this time, and if you are using premiums (tote bags, decals, etc.) I would scale back. Donors want to know that you are using their money for the cause, not for premiums. Anything that seems like waste will be a turnoff for potential donors.

Q: You have 10 minutes to introduce your organization to a business. How do you do that and once you do that, when do you make the ask? Do you leave and make a second visit or do you make the ask right there after the presentation?


First of all, if you said you were coming to provide them with information, you should not ask unless they tell you to. No one likes being ambushed. If you said you were coming to ask for their support, then yes, you can ask for their support after the presentation.

Before your presentation, you should already know basic information about the business—who is their target market, what other causes do they support, what kinds of connections do they have to your organization? Don’t use your valuable presentation time asking basic questions or giving them information they already know.

If you have ten minutes, focus on people and results. If possible, find a way to get them to ask questions. Adults are generally more engaged if they are an active part of the learning process and if they are provided with practical solutions to problems.

Pick a story: you could talk about a student who benefited from a scholarship, or a person who received lifesaving care, or an artist that provided an inspiring performance…whatever the human face is for your organization, talk about it. Your potential donors generally don’t need to know process, details on history—you just need to make them feel good about the organization.

Find a way to draw them into the story—questions like “what would you do if you were in such and such situation?” Of course, make sure that your organization solves that problem!

Ask for feedback to make sure you’re not talking at them. If they seem disengaged, ask what kinds of information they would like to have. Be ready to end the meeting early if necessary—they will appreciate you not wasting their time.

If they seem really excited about the program, go ahead and ask them if this is the kind of project they would like to support. Again, if you said this was just going to be informational, do NOT whip out a prepared proposal. But be ready to follow up with a proposal immediately after the meeting if they want one.

Connect with GoalBusters: LinkedIn - Alice Ferris / LinkedIn - Jim Anderson / Facebook / Twitter / YouTube / Myspace

Creating Effective, Meaningful Brochures

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When preparing your next brochure, focus on first impressions. You'll have mere seconds to get someone's attention.

What will they think in a "Blink?"

Here are some questions to consider, prepared by GoalBusters' Jim Anderson. Getting the answers right for your organization insures that your print materials reflect your values and your value.

Who's the Audience?
Who will you be giving this to? What action do you want to motivate them to? How can the brochure attract their attention enough so they want to know more?

What's the "hook?"
The front panel is your "storefront/display window." It should be visually interesting, vibrant and intriguing.

What's your story?
Someone needs to care about what you do before they care about how you do it. Story should be the ultimate goal. A few long content sections are fine, but more people will read it if you break up the content with design. If you have procedures or processes that you want to include, that can be available on a separate "fact sheet."

Why should we care?
Identify who you're helping. Identify the challenges they face. Identify why they need you. Identify how you help. Share the difference you make. Share how the reader can make a difference by supporting you. This sounds like a lot for a brochure, but you can achieve it by having your "non-verbal" communication (images, graphics, design) compliment your verbal communication (text). A picture is worth a 1,000 words.

Where are the people?
Story is driven by "who" you help. Faces and eyes make connections. More personal imagery will make a stronger connection.

What's your identity?
You should be able to communicate your organizational identity with design and graphics. One way to test this is to ignore text. If someone who did not speak English picked up the brochure, would they understand the nature of your organization based on the design, graphics and photos?

What does someone think in their first "Blink?"
Malcolm Gladwell's book "Blink" explores how we tend to make snap decisions. When someone gives the brochure a five second scan, how do we want them to feel? Do they feel anything? If not, we're wasting paper.

Connect with GoalBusters: LinkedIn - Alice Ferris / LinkedIn - Jim Anderson / Facebook / Twitter / YouTube / Myspace

A Remembrance for A Dedicated Volunteer

Amy set down her phone and raised her hand.

“May I have a moment? Teri’s gone.”

What followed was a deafening silence that probably didn’t last long, but felt like an eternity.

Jim was standing in front of the room, facilitating a portion of an all day board retreat for Flagstaff Community Partnership, a group of parents who provide peer to peer support for families with special needs children. He looked to me, and we both grasped for what to say to our grieving participants.

Teresa “Teri” Sanders was a strong advocate for the rights of special needs children. The board members described a passionate woman who was a force to be reckoned with. One person said, “You did not want to see her stand up in a meeting. One time she stood up and pointed her finger at someone, and I thought, ‘Good thing she’s on my side!’” Another board member elaborated, “Teri knew the law inside and out. She always knew what to say or do. What will we do without her?”

The people in the room continued their remembrances. Soon, it started to feel familiar. In my mind, I was transported back to the Quaker memorial service we attended for long-time Flagstaff philanthropist, Frances McAllister. I shared with our group what someone had shared then:

“If you continue to tell someone’s stories, they’re never truly gone.”

Interestingly, we had just worked on an exercise that the group had a difficult time completing. The group was trying to figure out the key stories for Flagstaff Community Partnership—what is your elevator speech? Whose stories do you tell to the outside world? What makes Flagstaff Community Partnership unique?

After hearing about Teri, we had our answer. As a parent of two special needs children, Teri had taken it upon herself to smooth the path for families, educating herself about resources, regulations and assistive services so that she could share the best of the best with others. She understood the difficulties parents of children with special needs were going through. She did all this as a volunteer, with no vested interest other than to make sure families didn’t have to unnecessarily struggle and had information that she didn’t have before. She embodied what Flagstaff Community Partnership is all about.

I like to think that Flagstaff Community Partnership will be telling Teri’s stories for many years to come. Jamie, the board president, said, “Teri’s definitely watching over us now.”

Although we never met Teri, we thank her for her dedication and service, and for being an inspiration for special needs advocates in Flagstaff for years to come.

Flagstaff Community Partnership:
http://www.flagstaffcommunitypartnership.org/

Teri Sanders’ obituary:
http://azdailysun.com/articles/2009/01/20/news/obituaries/20090120_obitu_189310.txt

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Connect with GoalBusters: LinkedIn - Alice Ferris / LinkedIn - Jim Anderson / Facebook / Twitter / YouTube / Myspace

Communicating Your Mission with Infectious Passion

It has been said that no one ever gave to an organization because of a Power Point presentation. Or a case statement.

Fundraisers talk about case statements a lot. It’s a document that outlines the history, mission and vision of the organization, plus gives the detail of the project that is the center of the fundraising campaign. Sometimes the documents are long, and sometimes they can be a bit dry.

The question becomes, “Will the donor even read it?” Maybe not.

So, turn your case statement into a “bedtime story.”

First, you have once upon a time. What was the situation that caused your organization to come into being?

Next, introduce your hero or heroine. This might be a founder, or a current leader, or a person your organization serves. Highlight the quest or mission—what do they want or need to accomplish?

Then, put obstacles in the way. Why can’t our hero succeed in the current state?

But don’t leave it at that. Describe what happily ever after looks like. Show how the world can be a better place if the hero accomplishes his or her goals.

Finally, put the donor in the story. Show how the donor can be your “deus ex machina” or “god from the machine.” Demonstrate that your donor can help make the happily ever after, happen.

It’s very easy to fall into the habit of putting together slides and charts to communicate your cause. While valid data is still critical to support your case, if you can develop a short “once upon a time” tale, you have a great way to immediately connect with a potential contributor.

This Tip is excerpted from “Storytelling: Communicating Your Mission with Infectious Passion,” soon to be presented in Tucson, Arizona. For more information on this workshop, contact GoalBusters or check our Workshops and Presentations page.

Also, for a great article on storytelling in fundraising by Alessandra Bianchi, visit Stanford Social Innovation Review.
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Connect with GoalBusters: LinkedIn - Alice Ferris / LinkedIn - Jim Anderson / Facebook / Twitter / YouTube / Myspace