Effective Online Storytelling

Effective Online Storytelling
Allan Pressel

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Today’s Speaker

Allan Pressel
CEO/Founder,
CharityFinders

Hosting: Sam Frank, Synthesis Partnership
Assisting with chat questions: April Hunt, Nonprofit Webinars

ONLINE STORYTELLING

Nonprofit Webinars
March 23, 2011
Presented by:
Allan Pressel, CEO/founder
CharityFinders
877-456-3210
www.CharityFinders.com
Allan@CharityFinders.com

Agenda
 Success Story Guidelines
 Sample Storytelling Approach
 Strategy
 Online Storytelling Tips
 “Don’t”s

 “Do”s

 Case Studies
 Exercise: Building an Online Story
 Q&A (throughout)

© CharityFinders, proprietary & confidential, not for reproduction

SUCCESS STORY GUIDELINES
 Focus on a specific success
 Individual
 Child
 Family
 Nonprofit
 Environment
 Segment of the community
 “Before” and “after” scenarios
 Discuss
 Programs and services
 Staff and volunteers
 Interviews:
 Staff
 Volunteers
 People that you helped
 Their family


SAMPLE STORYTELLING APPROACH
 Call to action on your home page
 Success story synopses (including pictures)
 Provide information people are actually interested in…
...but not all the information
 Give the reader a reason to click thru to the story
 Success story of the month
 Other success stories


Private Website Consultation

I’d like to offer each of you a free private website consultation

 One hour
 Consultation includes:
 CharityFinders’ assessment of your site
 Recommendations
 Building your nonprofit's most-needed functionality
 In person or by webinar
 Include anyone you want (e.g., ED, DD, board members, etc.)
 In one location or several
 We’ll contact you in 1-2 business days to schedule the
consultation


AN EFFECTIVE WEBSITE STORY STRATEGY: 6
STEPS
1. Define Content Strategy
 what content your organization needs

 how you are going to develop it

 how you are going to accomplish this content strategy

 Target Audiences

 Target Messages

 Target Transactions

2. Develop Content Style Guide
 Grammar & punctuation – naming conventions, abbreviations, etc.

 Writing and editing style - fact-checking to tone to length of prose.

 Fonts and characters –specific instructions font type, size, color, etc. for
headers, paragraphs, bullet points, click text and each section of the website
 Graphics and images – use, frequency, size, style, format, etc.


AN EFFECTIVE WEBSITE STORY STRATEGY: 6
STEPS (CONT.)

3. Produce
4. Edit/Proof
5. Publish
6. Maintain/Update


“DON’T”S
 “Don’t say a little in so many words but a great deal in a
few.” (Pythagoras)
 Simply take offline material and post it on your website
 Include too much content
 Use long paragraphs or lengthy prose
 Have lots of information “below the fold”
 Use pdf’s (unless the document is long or there is a
particular reason it needs to be a pdf)
 Make your stories hard to find
 Use old or obsolete stories
 Automatically play sound


“DO”S: DEVELOPING YOUR STYLE
 Incorporate humor
 Consistency with your branding, mission, and image
 Each story should have a purpose
 Present your business or nonprofit/cause in a
positive light
 Tug at their heartstrings, get them to believe in your
mission and want to support it


“DO”S: PLANNING YOUR CONTENT
 Ensure consistency in the way different stories are written
 If possible, tie results directly to prior donor or volunteer action
 Take notes on what you like and don’t like about other nonprofits’ stories
 Collect stories, examples, humor, and other content
 Exercise to think about what stories to include in your site
 Identify types of website visitors
 For each
 What do they want to SEE on your site?
 What do they want to DO on your site?
 Use stories to build better relationships with your constituents
 Address confidentiality issues
 Update your stories frequently
 Use metatags to drive search engine traffic to your stories


“DO”S: DEVELOPING YOUR CONTENT
 Engage: have an attention grabbing opening
 Interest: talk about what the website visitor wants to hear,
not what you want to tell them
 Entertain
 Inspire
 Motivate to take action
 Be concise
 Be credible
 Use bullets and lists
 Ensure all stories are well-written, error-free, and up-to-date


“DO”S: NAVIGATION

 Easy to find/navigate
 Hierarchical/drill-down


“DO”S: USE IMAGES
 Pictures
 Kids
 Animals
 Graphics
 Animation
 Audio
 Video
 Images should be:
 Large enough  Clickable if appropriate
 Of a sufficiently narrow subject  In a commonly used format (e.g. jpeg,
 Good resolution gif, etc.)
 Small file size  Consistently displayed across
 Properly cropped browsers, operating systems,
platform (PC vs. Mac)
 Including a caption


“DO”S: INTERACT WITH THE READERS OF
YOUR STORIES

 Feedback
 Referrals

 Polls

 Blogs

 Online Q&A

 E-mail list sign-up

 Story submittal


Your website: 7 Key Goals of an Effective Website

You should strive to achieve these goals for your site:
•Findability
•Stickiness
•Loyalty
•Referability
•Maximum conversion rate
•Dynamism
•Positive ROI


Contact Information

Allan Pressel, CEO/founder
Allan@CharityFinders.com
www.CharityFinders.com
1-877-456-3210

641 21st St.
Hermosa Beach, CA 90254


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Effective Online Storytelling

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