The Nonprofit FAQ

How do I set my marketing strategy?

You sit down with your board, your key staff, and other interested parties and talk through the key issues facing your organization. Concentrate on who you are, where you want to go, what your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOTs) will be over the next five years. Then you prepare a marketing plan. Generally, a marketing strategy involves a mix of what are commonly referred to as the 'four Ps,' or Product, Price, Promotion (advertising, sales promotion, publicity) and Place (distribution -- how people come to be buying or obtaining your product or service, i.e., over the Internet, via the phone, from a walk-in visit, with a credit card, by check, etc.). The marketing strategy must be expressed in terms of specific approaches to pricing, distribution/placement, personal selling, advertising, direct marketing, sales promotion and publicity/public relations. The Strategic Planning Workbook for Nonprofit Organizations, written by Bryan Barry and available for sale from the Amherst H. Wilder Foundation, 919 Lafond Avenue, St. Paul, MN 55104 (612-642-4025), might be a useful guide; their website is at http://www.wilder.org/ . Somewhat related but broader in scope is a publication available from The National Center for Nonprofit Boards, 2000 L Street, NW, Suite 510, Washington, DC 20036-4907 . Their strategic planning book for Boards is available through their online bookstore. See http://www.ncnb.org/bookstore/index.shtml Web site addresses updated and paragraph on the 4 P's added 12/18/00 --LBS