Free Flowing Thoughts

The Non-Profit Brand Series: What is a brand in the first place?

Whether you want it or not, your non-profit already has a brand.  From the first moment you told someone else about your organization you began building the brand.  Understanding the brand and influencing its direction is more important to your mission than most non-profits realize.  Your brand will impact who feels drawn to volunteer for your cause, who seeks your input in public policy, or whether or not they interact with your organization at all.

Your brand is more than the logo, it's beyond the organization's name, and it is more than a reputation.  Your brand encompasses every type of interaction people have with your organization.  It plays across every sense.  There are a number of great definitions of a brand, but my favorite comes from Casey Jones.  Your brand is not defined by what you think and feel, it is what your constituents think.  It is not developed by what you tell people to think, it is inferred from what you do and say. 

Everything brands.

As an organization you get to influence your brand, but you cannot directly manage it the way you can update a Web site or write an article.  Your brand becomes the accumulation of all these things you do.

If you are purposeful about influencing your brand, you can make it your most valuable asset to accomplishing your mission.  More on how to do that over the new few posts. 

The day I caved in and started a blog

I have to confess:  I was wrong.  I thought blogs were a fad and social media was for teenagers.  But over the past few months I watched as all the stuff I knew about online marketing became outdated and even companies like my current employer (Dell) began using social media in mainstream marketing. 

I'm calling this blog Free Flowing Thoughts. A few months ago I was on a conference call at work and apparently crossed the line between explaining a complex idea with many potential offshoots, and into the world of rambling.  After a pause, the meeting host asked if there were any other free flowing thoughts, or could we end the meeting...

Apparently I needed an outlet.  So here I am. 

For the most part I am not going cover corporate marketing, there are already some great blogs on that topic.  But after recently joining the board of the Military Child Education Coalition I am finding great content on marketing for the non-profit world much more rare.  As a new dad I am also fascinated by all things parenting.

Before corporate america taught me to write in bullet points and sentence fragments, I was once a good writer.  I'm hoping this blog gives me a chance to rebuild that skill.