Tools to Build a Stronger Nonprofit Sector

A little over a year ago I started introducing tools on the Social Velocity web site to help nonprofits, who might not be able to afford consulting services, grow their programs, create a financing strategy, revamp their board. I am blown away by how popular these tools have become.

I started Social Velocity almost four years ago because I saw a real hole in the nonprofit sector. Small and medium nonprofits working on social change lacked access to expertise and resources to strengthen and grow their solutions. The Teach for Americas of the world were building impressive organizations and replicating their solution far and wide. But they were doing so with the help of deep networks of experts and money. They were the lucky ones.

But there are equally impressive solutions housed in much smaller, less resourced nonprofit organizations that aren’t really seeing the light of day.  Because these organizations don’t know how to put a growth plan together, figure out how to finance the impact they want to have, or create a compelling ask for money to build, their solutions are not reaching as far as they could.

Social Velocity exists to help those small and medium-size nonprofits who want to be entrepreneurial, grow their programs, get their board engaged and invested, raise money to build their organization, break out of the starvation cycle.

And there are some nonprofits that are so small or so new that they aren’t ready yet for a customized solution. So our tools are there to help them start creating momentum on their own.

Our Step-by-Step Guides help a nonprofit to:

• Create a theory of change, which is the fundamental backbone of any nonprofit effort to get more strategic and garner more external support.
• Develop a case for support, a clear, well-articulated, compelling argument for why a donor should give to your nonprofit.
• Craft a sustainable financing plan, that lays out how enough, sustainable money will flow through your doors to support your mission.
• Create a business plan for an earned income venture to result in new, unrestricted revenue for your nonprofit.

And the E-books we have developed describe:

• How to move from the exhausting hamster wheel of fundraising to a more strategic, sustainable effort to finance your nonprofit, and
• How to create a groundbreaking board of directors that can strengthen and grow your impact

And our Monthly Webinars describe how to find individual donors, evaluate earned income potential, create a message of impact, raise capacity capital and much more.

You can learn more about all of our tools here.

I’m committed to continuing to expand our inventory of tools so that more nonprofits can strengthen and grow their impact. So I’d love your ideas for other tools you would like to see.

Where do you struggle and where do you need guidance? Let me know the kinds of tools you would like to see in this post’s comments, on our Facebook page, or via Twitter or email.

Photo Credit: Andrew Morrell Photography