Achieve more

Putting strategy to work for your nonprofit

Contents
3 15
What is strategy (and why Make it happen: strategies
should I care)? and tactics

5 21
Take stock: audiences and Ready, set, strategize
resources
25
9 Need more help?
Start with success: goals
and objectives

© 2018 Big Duck Studio, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this eBook may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical,
including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the author.

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What is strategy
(and why should
I care)?
In the nonprofit world, strategy is an essential concept with a usability
problem: the terminology is fuzzy and imprecise, it means different things
to different people, and it sounds like it has more to do with fighting battles
than achieving missions.

At Big Duck, we describe strategy as the practice of defining what you want to achieve
and identifying the best ways to achieve it. In fact, we sometimes prefer to use the
term “strategic thinking,” because we’re really talking about an approach rather than an
outcome—a way of breaking down a problem or responding to an opportunity.

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What is strategy (and why should I care)?

The best strategic thinking is durable and not too prescriptive—it can guide your reactions A note: The language of strategy
to unforeseen circumstances as well as help you plot your course proactively. Strategy can be evolved in the context of war, and
we know martial language doesn’t
expressed in many tangible ways, including detailed plans, but it all flows from a disciplined
always feel right out of context, so
and grounded style of problem-solving that helps you make better decisions and more we’ll do our best to limit its use and
effectively reach your goals at every level. clarify our meanings where we can.
The ability to create, communicate, and apply clear strategy is essential to the job of a nonprofit
communicator (or any nonprofit leader, for that matter). So we’re sharing some of the tools we
use to help us think strategically about questions of all kinds. In this ebook, we’ll cover...

How your audiences, your landscape, and the resources at your disposal should frame
„„
your approach

Guidelines for setting a clear goal and breaking it down into understandable objectives
„„

What strategies and tactics are, and some tips for choosing the right ones
„„

Ready to make better decisions with us? Let’s go.

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Take stock:
audiences and resources
Take stock: audiences and resources

To create effective communications strategy, you’ll need to identify who you

need to reach and what you have to work with.

Know your audiences

Knowledge of your audiences shapes your strategies and defines your tactics. Conversely, your
goals, objectives, strategies, and tactics will naturally define your audiences if you’ve crafted them
effectively. It's especially important in communications to stop and check that your strategy is
focused on engaging the right people.

Let’s say, for example, that your goal is to educate about toxic materials in the home, and your
primary audience is architects. You’re probably going to do better putting an ad in an industry
publication than buying a billboard on the highway. But if your primary audience is homeowners,
you’re going to take a very different approach, both to your strategy (e.g., appealing to a desire to
protect yourself and your family) and your tactics (e.g., a consumer-focused website, perhaps).

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Take stock: audiences and resources

Assess your resources

Your approach to any problem is limited by the time, money, expertise, and other assets at
your disposal.

If money were no object, you’d probably identify completely different strategies and tactics
(Super bowl ads! Celebrity partnerships! Fancy giveaways!). Or (perhaps a more realistic example)
let’s imagine you have an in-house designer with some extra time on their hands. You’ll be in a
better position to pursue a strategy that relies on beautifully-produced materials than you would
be if you had to find and pay for a freelance professional to bring your ideas to life.

So take stock of what you have, and shape your strategy from there when possible. Be sure to
consider both your constraints (e.g., a limited budget) and your untapped opportunities (e.g., an
enterprise-level email marketing system that no one on your team quite knows how to use yet).

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Take stock: audiences and resources

Here are some of the assets a nonprofit communicator might consider:

Your team’s time, knowledge, and skills

„„ Volunteer power
„„

Insights from research

„„ Partnerships and coalitions
„„

Learnings from past successful (or

„„ A charismatic leader, celebrity connection,
„„
unsuccessful) efforts or other spokesperson

Budget and donated resources (e.g.,

„„ Donated media assets (e.g., free ad
„„
donated space) space on bus stops)

Your deadline/timeframe
„„

The tools and technology you’ve

„„
already got

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Start with success:
goals and objectives
Start with success: goals and objectives

Before you begin problem-solving, articulate what you’re out to accomplish.

“Goals” and “objectives” are what you work towards, but are often conflated
and used interchangeably. It's useful to know how and why they differ.

Goals are big-picture statements of what you are striving to achieve.

„„

Objectives are measurable outcomes that indicate you’ve achieved your goal.
„„

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Start with success: goals and objectives

Tips for writing and recognizing a goal: Goals are big-picture

statements of what you are
A goal is specific, but it may be abstract—like a state of being or a feeling
„„ striving to achieve.

A strong goal will point toward a way of solving a problem, not just state that we will solve it
„„
(e.g., not just “increase awareness of Program A” but “increase participation of NYC teens that
have experienced homelessness”)

Depending on the opportunity or problem you’re trying to solve, it might be okay to have a set
„„
of goals, rather than a single, overarching goal (e.g., as part of a strategic plan)

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Start with success: goals and objectives

Tips for writing and recognizing objectives: Objectives are measurable

outcomes that indicate you’ve
Objectives are more tangible and concrete than goals
„„ achieved your goal.
Objectives should be SMART:
„„
Specific: ideally unambiguous—it should be completely clear
whether you’ve reached an objective or not
Measurable: provable, but doesn’t have to mean quantifiable
Achievable: takes reality into account
Relevant: directly related to a goal you’ve identified
Time-bound: in a specific, defined time frame

A well-written objective probably starts with an action verb (grow, reach, find, make, etc.)
„„

The way you write your objectives will probably point the way toward your strategies and tactics
„„

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Start with success: goals and objectives

How goals and objectives work together

A well-written goal can tell you where you’re going, but it might be hard to know whether or not
you’ve succeeded without detailed objectives that define success. And an objective alone doesn’t
give you much information about why.

Let’s look at an example:

GOAL OBJECTIVE
Increase unrestricted income Secure gifts from 500 first-time donors
from individual donors by the end of this fiscal year

Here we’ve got a specific goal, and an example of a clear objective that, while it probably isn’t the
only outcome we’d need to achieve, is directly relevant to what we’re ultimately trying to do.

By itself, “Increase unrestricted income” is too vague—there’s no way to know when or whether
we’ve achieved it. And our objective taken alone would lack critical context when it comes time to
define strategies and tactics: it’s important that those funds are unrestricted, so that we can apply
them at our discretion to fund our greatest needs. The two together give us a much more complete
picture of what we need to do.

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Start with success: goals and objectives

Be sure you’ve effectively defined your problem or

opportunity
Goals and objectives alone don’t always tell the full story. To ensure that your goals and
objectives are on point, you’ll need to explicitly identify why you’re doing this—the problem
you need to solve. Without that critical context, you’ll risk misstating your goal or choosing
the wrong objectives.

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Start with success: goals and objectives

Let’s imagine, for example, you need to recruit more participants for one of your programs.
Sounds straightforward enough. But depending on the reason behind that goal, you might have
significantly different objectives—and therefore different actions (strategies and tactics).

Example A Example B

PROBLEM
Our teen program is under-enrolled, and if we don’t
meet a minimum number of participants, we’ll have to
cancel it.
GOAL
Recruit participants for teen education workshop
OBJECTIVE
Get 18 new teens to sign up for the program by March 31
This goal and objective is about fast, short-term
recruitment. Strategies are likely to focus on things
like urgency, identifying and reaching the likeliest
prospects quickly, and providing incentives for
participation.
PROBLEM
We want to expand the impact of our teen program by
continually engaging new people and new communities.
GOAL
Recruit participants for teen education workshop
OBJECTIVE
Get 4 new teens to sign up for the program every month
This approach suggests strategies that will center
on a sustainable and regular system that can be
maintained over time, like identifying partners
who can provide ongoing referrals, conducting
research into the most effective channels for
reaching teens, and creating staff capacity to keep
growing the program over time.

Same goal, different problems—and very different objectives and actions.

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Make it happen:
strategies and tactics
Make it happen: strategies and tactics

Now that you know where you’re headed (goals and objectives), it’s time for
action—defining how you’ll actually get there. Separating your strategies from
your tactics makes your thinking more durable and effective.

Strategies are specific approaches that guide your actions and decisions in the service of your goal.
„„

Tactics are the action steps you take to carry out your strategy.
„„

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Make it happen: strategies and tactics

Tips for writing and recognizing strategies: Strategies are specific

approaches that guide your
A strategy is actionable, but it’s not an action itself
„„ actions and decisions in the
service of your goal.
A strategy should provoke you to ask, “how would I do that?” which leads you to tactics
„„

There should be many different ways (i.e., a range of tactics) that you could use to enact
„„
your strategy

A powerful strategy can be used reactively as well as proactively

„„

To come up with smart strategies, take a step back and consider your context—audiences,
„„
resources, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats—then identify what the
best approaches are, in light of your goal, and think about how you can make the most of
those approaches

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Make it happen: strategies and tactics

Tips for writing and recognizing tactics: Tactics are the action steps you
take to carry out your strategy.
Tactics are actions: you need to get your hands dirty to implement them
„„

Your tactics are limited by what you have access to—the opportunities, resources, tools, and
„„
capacity that you and your team bring to a particular problem

Organize your ideas and actions into clear categories that make sense. Every tactic should
relate directly to one or more strategies in pursuit of your goal, and every strategy should have
one or more associated action items (tactics). It’s fine if there’s some cross-pollination—in fact,
if two different strategies both point you toward the same tactic, you’ll know you’re getting
good bang for your buck.

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Make it happen: strategies and tactics

Is that a strategy or a tactic?

One of the trickiest challenges when applying these concepts is that there’s no absolute answer as
to whether a particular idea or action item is a strategy or a tactic.

Clear strategic thinking can be applied to a problem at any level—from the biggest, most imposing
organizational challenge to the smallest everyday project. The way you think about goals,
objectives, strategies, and tactics is exactly the same in all cases. What changes—and what helps
you differentiate between all of these different concepts—is where you’re standing: in other words,
what your battlefield looks like.

In a military context, your battlefield might be an entire continent or a single stretch of ground,
depending on your rank and position.

In a nonprofit, the board and Executive Director or CEO are responsible for setting goals from the
highest possible vantage point, thinking about how they intersect with and inform every other
aspect of the nonprofit’s work. An entry-level communications associate operates within that
larger strategic framework set by the leadership, but can have goals, objectives, strategies, and
tactics of their own, too.

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Make it happen: strategies and tactics
Let’s use the example of No More Cancer (a fictional organization) to break it down.
What the CEO or Chief Communications
Officer might be accountable for
PROBLEM
People affected by cancer don’t know that we exist
GOAL
Make No More Cancer the first place people turn when
they receive a cancer diagnosis
OBJECTIVE
50% increase in requests for our newly-
diagnosed toolkit
STRATEGY
Make No More Cancer easy to find when you’re
searching for any information about cancer online
TACTIC
Implement an effective Google AdWords campaign
In this example, leadership’s tactic
is the associate’s goal—but both
can apply clear strategic thinking
What the Communications Associate to the problems that they’re
might be accountable for individually responsible for solving.
PROBLEM
People affected by cancer aren't finding and
downloading our newly-diagnosed kit
GOAL
Run an effective Google AdWords campaign that
reaches people newly diagnosed with cancer
OBJECTIVE
400 downloads of our newly-diagnosed toolkit from
new contacts by the end of March
STRATEGY
Make the toolkit feel really high value, easy to find,
simple to download
TACTIC
Craft ad copy and tailor the landing page to
emphasize speed (“in just 30 seconds...”) and
highlight features that we know are useful when
facing a diagnosis (“a comprehensive list of all the
questions you need to ask your care provider”)
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Make it happen: strategies and tactics

How do we know we’re on the right track?

Committing to a specific strategy or set of tactics implicitly means that you’re not advancing other
potential strategies—and limiting your options can feel alarming.

The best way to ensure that you’re taking the right approach is through research: understanding
the problem, learning about your audiences, anticipating what will work and what won’t. But
that can be expensive and time-consuming, and sometimes it’s not appropriate to the scale of the
problem at hand.

Whether or not you decide to invest in research to inform your actions, remember: pursuing every
strategy is effectively pursuing none. That being said, aim to deploy more than one strategy in
the service of a particular goal or set of objectives, when appropriate, so you can evaluate what
strategy is most effective and adjust as needed.

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Ready, set, strategize
Ready, set, strategize

So how can you actually use goals, objectives, strategies, and

tactics in your day-to-day work?
The next time you’re planning your approach to a problem, need, or opportunity, try breaking it
down strategically. The worksheet at the end of this ebook can help.

It’s okay to start from the bottom (or in the middle, or...)

Strategy isn’t necessarily a linear process. Depending on the problem you’re trying to solve, you
may come up with tactics in the beginning and work your way up to your goals and objectives,
or define an objective before you take a step back to identify the problem. It’s natural: your
opportunities, capacity, and resources should inform your actions and aspirations to ensure that
what you’re doing makes sense to real people in the real world.

But when you start at the tactical level, don’t skimp on strategic thinking: push yourself to
identify how each of your activities really supports your organization’s goals or helps you solve a
key problem. “Let’s start a newsletter” might be a great idea—but you can’t be sure until you’ve
connected it to a smart strategy and a relevant goal.

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Ready, set, strategize

Here’s a scenario that might sound familiar if you’ve worked a long time in the nonprofit sector.
A supporter approaches No More Cancer (our fictional nonprofit) with an offer: they’d like to
donate a radio spot on their favorite NPR show to raise awareness for the organization, and they’re
willing to pay for all the associated production costs.

Here, we’re starting with a tactic: run a promo on “Wait Wait Don’t Tell Me.” By filling in the
strategic context, we’ll be better able to make the most of the opportunity.

Questions we might ask to get us there:

Which of our big-picture goals could this spot help advance? What problem might it help us solve?
„„

What objectives will help us break down that goal into measurable chunks?
„„

What strategy might help us fulfill those objectives, knowing that a radio promo will be at least
„„
one of our tactics?

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Ready, set, strategize

Here’s what our strategy worksheet might look like once it’s all filled out:

PROBLEM
People affected by cancer don’t know that we exist

GOAL
Make No More Cancer the first place people turn when
they receive a cancer diagnosis

OBJECTIVE
50% increase in requests for our newly-diagnosed toolkit

STRATEGY
Build our awareness with people before they’re actually
diagnosed

TACTIC
Run a promo on a radio show with national distribution

This kind of situation is common for nonprofits. It’s also a great example of why it’s so
important to have a current, living strategic plan for your organization, as well as for your
communications: tying an opportunity to an existing need is much easier to do when
you’ve already invested some time in identifying where your organization needs to go and
how you intend to get there.

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Need more help?
We’ve developed other resources on this topic you can access for free on
our website: visit www.bigducknyc.com to read case studies, articles,
watch videos.

Big Duck regularly works with nonprofit organizations to develop smart

strategies. Contact us at 718-237-9551 or hello@bigducknyc.com.

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Strategy worksheet
Use this worksheet to map out a strategic plan of action.

Problem:

Goal Objective
A big-picture statement of what you are striving A measurable outcome that indicates you’ve
to achieve achieved your goal

Strategy Tactic
A specific approach that guides your actions and An action step you take to carry out your strategy
decisions in the service of your goal

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