From Missions to Movements with Dana Snyder
About This Episode
This week on Mission Forward, Carrie Fox sits down with Dana Snyder, a digital strategist for nonprofits and the CEO and founder of Positive Equation. Snyder, who has supported organizations like Movember, Dress for Success, and American Idol, shares her insights on how nonprofits can effectively reach new audiences in the ever-evolving digital landscape.
Consider, for example, the importance of strategic investment in social media. How are organizations to determine which channels to focus their resources on based on their values and target audience? Snyder emphasizes the significance of data-driven decision-making, recommending tools like Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity to understand how visitors interact with an organization's website and social media channels. But more importantly, she highlights how most individuals are tilted toward good, and that your audience might just be comfortable in large numbers on platforms you personally find misaligned with your own values.
Throughout the episode, Snyder stresses the importance of being genuinely social on social media platforms, creating platform-specific content, and fostering meaningful connections with followers. She suggests that organizations consider hiring virtual assistants to manage their social media presence if it aligns with their budgets and priorities.
The conversation also touches on the role of artificial intelligence in content creation for nonprofits. Snyder offers practical advice on how to train AI tools to generate relevant and engaging content while staying true to an organization's mission and values.
For nonprofits looking to make the most of their social media efforts, this episode of Mission Forward offers valuable insights and actionable tips from a seasoned digital strategist. Our great thanks to Dana for helping us to navigate the digital landscape authentically.
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Breaking news.
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Breaking news.
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It's the year of the chat box.
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The latest setback for Climate Act.
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The latest Supreme Court ruling.
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The court is set to redefine.
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In the latest, Supreme Court ruling. The court is set to redefine.
Carrie Fox:
Hi there and welcome to the Mission Forward podcast. I'm Carrie Fox, your host and CEO of Mission Partners, a social impact communications firm and certified B corporation. Thanks for tuning in to today's episode.
Today I've got a new voice to the Mission Forward podcast, but an old and wonderful friend of mine joining us for a great conversation.
Dana Snyder is a digital strategist for nonprofits and the CEO and founder of Positive Equation. She has supported organizations like Movember, Dress for Success, American Idol, and several Mission Partners clients along the way as an expert guide. She helps organizations activate the latest digital innovation tools and strategies and she's got some good stuff in store for us today.
Dana is also an international keynote speaker who travels all around the world speaking with nonprofit leaders about how to use social media ads to transform online experiences. She trains people how to retain donors with their monthly giving programs. I know that's a question you always raise with us here at Mission Forward, and she's the host of a great podcast called Missions to Movements that I was excited to appear on recently. And we will be sure to link to that episode and her show into the today's show notes.
Dana, I'm thrilled to have you. Thanks for making time for this conversation.
Dana Snyder:
Of course. It's always fun to get to chat with you and connect with you, so I am very pleased to be here with you to make the time.
Carrie Fox:
Awesome. So I mentioned at the top you are an old friend and I have seen you grow your firm from its very early stages to this incredibly impactful global agency that's supporting nonprofits in so many ways. I want to hear how you got here? What drove you to start Positive Equation and what continues to drive your work?
Dana Snyder:
Some guts and luck.
Carrie Fox:
And heart and smarts too, right?
Dana Snyder:
That's right. That's right. No, I think it really all started when I was in college. I got the bug for philanthropy through participating in dance marathons. If any of your listeners are familiar, I was a die hard dance marathon supporter. I started as a participant at UCF Go Knights when we were raising, gosh Carrie, it was like $20,000 at the time. And as a participant, I was like, "This is crazy." We are at the time, and I think we still might be one of the largest universities in the country, if not the largest with 50, 60,000 plus undergrad students. And so I was like, "If every student gave a dollar, that would be $50,000." So I just was like, "I want to help make this happen." And then, by the time I left, we were netting out, I think it was close to $90,000. I actually have our $51,000 plate on the wall here when we surpassed 50k, and it's all student run. And then now in more recent years, the students at UCF are raising over a million dollars-
Carrie Fox:
That's incredible-
Dana Snyder:
... every single year for the children's hospitals in Orlando.
Carrie Fox:
That's incredible.
Dana Snyder:
Right? That was the bug. And I was always on the external team side. So that was sponsorships and partnerships and marketing. So from 18, I was out in the community making financial deals with businesses on how you can support the organization.
Fast-forward, I think what's made me successful in being an entrepreneur is I saw my dad become an entrepreneur when I was in middle school and take that risk. And I remember so vividly my mom was going back to school to be a teacher and he was like, "I'm going to give it three years. If I'm not successful after three years, I'll go back." And he's been doing that business for over 24 years now or something like that. And so I saw him take that risk. And so I think I never had a fear of risk and curiosity. And so I did go work for a nonprofit. I worked in the corporate space. I just wanted to learn as much as possible. I lived in New York City. I lived in LA. I'm now in Atlanta. I'm kind of like a fish. I go wherever and I get comfortable and meet all the amazing people.
And then in 2017, 7 years ago, I was like, "You know what? I think I want to do my own thing." And I've learned some good nuggets and got some really cool experience from working with some really big for-profit companies and got to meet the teams at Meta and Twitter, back then Twitter, and Instagram and LinkedIn, and then take those skills and experience and transfer them back into the nonprofit space that I work in now.
So I don't know. I mean I feel like probably similar to you, ebbs and flows. I was very much an agency when I first started because that's what I knew. And then now I am more of a one to many. I have my podcast that you mentioned, Missions to Movements. I do an ads challenge twice a year where I work with nonprofits and actually those that serve nonprofits. I'm building their email list because that's really important, and doing that through ads, so acquiring people. And then my Monthly Giving Mastermind and Summit that's coming up in September and a book, all the things-
Carrie Fox:
You're incredible-
Dana Snyder:
... monthly giving. So there's just, yeah, it's taking risks everywhere, I think, is risks and leaps and connecting with really great people like yourself.
Carrie Fox:
There are so many things I love about you, Dana, but what I feel jumping out of this scream and out of your microphone is that you are not just this incredible curious learner who just loves to dig in and learn things. You're an incredible teacher. And one of the very first experiences I had with you, I still remember what you said. We were on a call and you said, "Look, many times when it comes to digital and specifically social media, organizations put the person in the lowest rung of the organization, the most junior intern on social media." And there are such high stakes on how you're showing up as a brand on social media.
So you really started very early on helping organizations make the case that there should be a strategic investment made in how organizations use social. I've always appreciated that point of view and how you then as a teacher, guide people on how to learn those skills.
Dana Snyder:
Yeah, I try and be really tactical. I think that's the number one thing that people always say, is there's one thing to be inspirational. And there is definitely a time and a place for that. And I try and be that in teaching too. But I also try and always make sure that there's learnings of things that you can immediately do and implement into your organization. Yeah.
Carrie Fox:
All right. Well, that's where we're going to go today because we've got finite time and I want to pick your brain on some things. So coming into this conversation, I went back and looked at all of the questions we get and the two questions we get most often on social I want to dig into with you.
So the first one is, I hear this all the time from our nonprofit clients, but also folks who listen to the podcast and want to get our take on this question that oftentimes nonprofits reach out and they say, "Look, we want to be on every channel. We want to connect with the widest net of donors possible. We can't afford to leave anyone behind." But that is rarely a winning strategy to distribute what are often finite resources to begin with across as many channels as we can.
And so what we often guide them to do is think first through your values and think through your audience and determine where your audience is and what they need from you, have those clear goals to social engagement. But the reality is today there's a lot of things that are pushing and pulling on how and when people show up on social. So I'd love to pick your brain on this. How do you answer that when folks say, where do I be, where do I put my time on social?
Dana Snyder:
Such a good question and I get the same one. And I agree that is very common. It's just like let's just blast everything everywhere. And I want to say two things. I'm a very data driven person, and so the place that I always recommend people to go are to Google Analytics, which is now GA4, and/or you can utilize this great free tool, they're both free, called Microsoft Clarity. And Microsoft Clarity integrates with your Google Analytics, but it gives you some fun features too, like heat maps. You can see where people are clicking around on your site to do edits. So I always say look at your data first. And what you'll find on either of those tools is a section around social and traffic. How are people getting to your website?
And oftentimes we're always looking at the quantity of people. So let's just say for instance, our top acquisition of traffic from social is, I'm going to make this up, but Facebook. But if you slide over, if you look over on the right-hand side, it's going to tell you what's the time spent on that site from that channel.
So if Facebook is having a bounce rate of 80% and people are spending 30 seconds, however, if you go down the funnel a little bit and you see, for example, LinkedIn is sending maybe less people to you right now, but the bounce rate's 50% and they're spending three minutes on your site and they're going to multiple pages, then LinkedIn is a solid place that you should be investing some time because those are quality visitors.
And most of the time, our goal, which you're saying the intention is to get people to our site to sign up for an email, to donate, to sign up for an event, whatever the action is. So data is going to inform you about where to spend your time. And I really recommend one to two channels. That's it. Focus on where you can shine and create quality content there.
I really only focus on LinkedIn, Instagram, and sometimes I have some video content that goes on YouTube. And what I've done for the channels, you may be saying, "Wait, wait, wait, but we've been posting here all the time." What I've done, and please copy this, I have a Twitter account or X, but it has a post that is, a tweet, sorry, that is pinned to the top that says "I'm not here, but you can find me here, here, here, here." And I have links.
Instagram's not your place? Don't be there. Own the channel. Get that SEO with the name, but put a post that says, "We're not here. But click the link in bio where you can find us." So you got it, you own it, but you're not there and don't feel the pressure to be there.
Carrie Fox:
Amazing. That is such a great recommendation. Everyone listening, please go do that.
And I also imagine that with that data driven strategy, you can be checking over time and saying, "Ooh, LinkedIn's been working for us really well, but ooh, what is going on with this spike over here now? Maybe we should change that." So how often are you looking at that strategy?
Dana Snyder:
I would say monthly, quarterly. Taking a look overall at your analytics and your data, this is the same year. Google Analytics in your website, especially if you have blog posts, is such a rich prime place for data.
One quick example of this is during my last Ads Challenge in March, there was an organization that was trying to figure out what their freebie was going to be. So in the Ads Challenge, we have a lead magnet, which is a freebie that we create based upon values aligned on the audience you're trying to get their email address of. So I said, "Look at what's already working."
So we looked at some of their blogs and they realized, it was a heart organization, so some of their recipes were top performing blog posts, and I was like, "Great. Let's just repurpose that into a download and use that," and it skyrocketed. The goal of the Ads Challenge is 100 new emails in seven days, and they got 246, I think.
Carrie Fox:
Wow, amazing. Can you just tell me real quick, how do folks get involved in the Ads Challenge?
Dana Snyder:
Yeah, just go to positiveequation.com and then you'll be able to click through to Ads Challenge right at the top.
Carrie Fox:
Awesome. Is that just for nonprofits?
Dana Snyder:
No, it's nonprofits or I've also worked with nonprofit consultants. It could honestly be anybody in this space that is interested in their email list.
Carrie Fox:
Very cool. Amazing.
Okay, so let's talk AI for a minute because I know AI is showing up inside nonprofit organizations in so many ways and folks are thinking about how and when do I use it for content creation and how should I not use it? Is there anything you're seeing or guiding folks on how to or not to use AI in this moment?
Dana Snyder:
Oh man, I think I'm figuring it out as everybody else is. There's an amazing Fundraising.AI summit that's led by my good friend Mallory Erickson in the fall. I think they've released the date of October 1st, so you can check that out online, and that is the place to be for everything.
My one recommendation is if you're starting from square one and you just want to test things out, with ChatGPT, what I hear people say is, "Oh, it just gives me crap. It's giving me good information back." But you have to talk to it like you're training an employee.
So what I have learned is, and I learned this from another podcast I was listening to because I'm totally stealing this tip, is you have to instruct it on who you want it to be. For example, you have to tell it, "You are a copywriter. You're an expert copywriter, specifically in the nonprofit industry, and you are focused on these three things. I want you to be able to create," da, da, da, da, and you basically give it its resume, and then the next prompt is write three different headlines for X, Y, and Z. But you just don't start with write three headlines. You have to give it a little bit of context. So ...
Carrie Fox:
Train the tool.
Dana Snyder:
Yeah, train the tool. You have to train it and just play around with it and test it. It's been really beneficial. I've used it even for a starting base for contracts. I've used it for a starting base for creating a job description for my brand partnerships manager that I hired in January. So you can use it for a lot of things that you might not think about.
I'm actually going to use it to help structure the book that I'm working on, although I'm going to feed it all of the interviews I've been doing and give me highlights from each conversation. So there's so many different use cases that you can be creative with.
Carrie Fox:
Cool. Did I tell you I now have a digital twin?
Dana Snyder:
What?
Carrie Fox:
There's a digital twin of me out in the world, Dana. So let me tell you about this because our audience might be interested in this too. If you go over to our Mission Forward website, missionforward.us and pop to our podcast page, you'll see a box that pops up that says Ask Carrie. And so you can say, "Tell me about how to drive equity through communications," or "What are Carrie's principles in her book," or, "What did Carrie talk about with Dana? What are the key takeaways?" And my digital twin will scrape everything from my content, from the podcast and my weekly blogs and it'll report back, here's some things to consider, and then it gives you direct links to-
Dana Snyder:
I've heard-
Carrie Fox:
... those episodes-
Dana Snyder:
... of the tool.
Carrie Fox:
So we're in pilot phase with it. It's incredible. It's really a wonderful tool. It's a great example of how to use AI that's actually still within your own atmosphere. It's our content. We own that content. It's not pulling from anywhere other than us. And so it's been trained with what to talk about and how to summarize complex information.
Dana Snyder:
That's amazing. I need to do that with everything I've talked about with monthly giving.
Carrie Fox:
Yes, yes. So anyway, go check out our digital twin, which might be a scary thing to think there's a digital twin of me in the world, but it's kind of fun.
All right, that was big question one, how do we decide where to be and how to distribute those resources across channels? Big question number two comes down to values. And you are such a proponent of this, right? You and I both lead purpose-driven businesses. You are purpose to the core. We know that there's a lot of questions people have on, "Should I be on Facebook? I don't know if I align with the values of Meta, but my audience is there." Those are tough questions.
And what I often guide folks is there's no right answer. Every organization needs to make the decisions that are right for them. Just make sure you can back it up. Just have a rationale for it. But this is a question I want to pick your brain on is, how do you answer that when folks say, "I feel like I could get a lot of revenue from this channel, but it's not aligned with my values"?
Dana Snyder:
So I think that goes back to exactly what you talked about, what's your organization's constitution? What are the values and things that drive you?
It is true. I mean, Meta as a whole, if you're saying you're not going to be on Facebook, that should also mean you're not going to be on Instagram, you're not going to be on WhatsApp, you're not going to advertise or any of those tools. And the truth is they're billions. Your audience is there. I always laugh when people say, "My audience isn't on Facebook." I'm like, "Yes, they are." Whether they're engaged or they're just lurking, they're there. My 71-year-old mother is there and 13-year-old kids are there. And it is still extremely relevant.
So yeah, I would just go back to overall, if your main goal is to service the people looking what you need and on the donor side fulfilling their values, and these are the places that they are, is that the game that you're willing to play right now? Because that's the fact is that they're there. So I think it just goes down to is the greater good to be able to provide the resources that you have to people where they are more so than focusing on the business fundamentals.
And the truth is, I think overarching, everyone's trying to do good, right? Sure, business is not always great, and some people make bad decisions, bad calls. But we are the ones that can make, I always try and say, lift the platform to be better by putting out great, impactful content information. And if your article or you get one new donor or somebody finds you that needs your service on that platform and it changes their life, was that worth it?
Carrie Fox:
Right. Yeah. It's a good perspective. Really good point of view.
You've been doing this for a while. You have really dug in. You understand the channels. You know what's happened on the back end. You know how to make the most of them and leverage them. What have you learned over time that you think is really important for folks who are listening and they're thinking, "I'm not making the most of my social media. Where do I begin? What should I know what matters now in this environment?"
Dana Snyder:
Oh my gosh, one of the key things I want to say is we get so stressed out by not receiving engagement and attention on the platforms. It sometimes can feel like you are posting into an atmosphere and no one is responding to you. And I know I have felt that way, and that one thing that I have realized more and more the more I am out at conferences is someone has actually come up to me and said, "You're the Dana Snyder on LinkedIn." And I was like, "What?" Or people reference a piece of content that they did not engage with at all.
People might be watching what you're doing and just not might be saying anything. So keep putting out the content. And again, I would just say to really focus on the places where your audience is telling you that they're finding you. And B, the biggest takeaway is there is still this notion of blasting things out on the channel and not actually communicating with people on there.
You have to have platform-specific content. What's going to work best on Facebook is not going to work on Instagram. They're two different platforms. They have two different types of content and you have to be social on social.
And there's a lot of organizations that have small teams and they're like, "I don't have the bandwidth to do that." And I hear you. I totally hear you. My advice is if you can, within your budgets, within your marketing budgets, there should be a social media line item and to hire a virtual assistant or somebody to help you to do that. Because if your energy and your skillset is not in it, A, your content's going to feel it. And B, your time is so much better spent on the things that you excel at.
So even though budgets might be tight, it was so beneficial to me to hire a virtual assistant to focus on that stuff for me. There's a great company called morethangiving.co that are VAs specifically for the nonprofit space, and you can start at just 10 hours a month if you want. It's super limited, and they specifically focus on what you need and they find the person for you. So that would be my advice, is don't try and do everything yourself, especially if it's not the thing that lights you up. Focus on those things and hire somebody else to do the others.
Carrie Fox:
Right. Right. And going back to your point from earlier too, it's another great reason to say focus in. Don't try to be everywhere. Focus in on a few things and do those things really well.
Dana Snyder:
Start with one channel, right? Don't even try and do two, just start with one. And then have a good content strategy there that's actually focused on what the platform is meant to do and is focused on. So Instagram, carousels, reels content. When I see organizations posting the old school posters with tiny, small print as a social post and wondering why there's no engagement, that's why. One, nobody can read it and you're just posting. And this is actually really interesting. I just saw an organization post a LinkedIn post asking people to listen to a podcast episode with no link. So I'm like, "How are they going to know where to go?"
Carrie Fox:
Yes. Right, right.
Dana Snyder:
And it's like sometimes we don't ... That next step, think about what's the action that you want somebody to take from this specific piece of content.
Carrie Fox:
Yeah. Make it easy. Make it easy for folks.
All right, we got time for one last question. You talked at the top about how data informs your decisions. I love that. You're using data to listen to that audience. Do you have any recommendations for teams who are wanting to get closer to their audiences in other ways, whether that's serving or picking up the phone and talking to some of their most engaged audiences, things that you see that tend to work?
Dana Snyder:
So specifically from a social standpoint?
Carrie Fox:
Yes.
Dana Snyder:
Okay. So this is where the power of direct messages comes into play. Listener, if you have never gone through either your LinkedIn followers, Instagram followers and sent direct messages to those people. And what I love the most on both of those channels is there's an audio option. And people will be blown away if they receive an audio message from somebody at your organization. And it can be as simple as: Why did you start to follow us? What excites you about our mission? And wait for them to respond.
What I see more often in DMs is just a push to donate. There's no further relationship building. And DMs, if we remember send push notifications to our phone. So they are way higher seen and engaged with than emails. And I don't care if it's 500 followers. That's amazing. Think about 500 people in a ballroom. You would fill up the space. So don't think, "Oh, this is so little." That's actually an amazing time to be even more one-to-one with people and get to know them and invite them to specific things.
So get into those DMs. I mean, slide right in and say hello to everybody and ask them a question to get a response back that then you can add to your CRM or whatever tool you have.
Carrie Fox:
Amazing.
Dana, as always, you promise what you say at the top, the practical nature of how you think through these really tough, complicated questions for folks is so welcome. And as we're wrapping up today, a few things I'm taking home and will reinforce is data drives decisions. Don't underestimate the power of the data, and use some of the tools that Dana mentioned today. Build deeper relationships with your audience, with those who are engaging with you. Go beyond the pushing of the content. Think about how you can engage them in more meaningful ways and learn from them too.
And less is more. Don't try to be everywhere or certainly don't try to be everything to everyone. Know who you are. Know what you stand for. We talk about that a lot here. And then live that, live that through your social presence.
So Dana, what an awesome conversation and I'll give you the last word. Anything that's giving you hope or optimism or excitement that you want to leave us with today?
Dana Snyder:
Yeah. I actually had a really fabulous conversation on my podcast with Joe Quenqua. We worked together at DKC, the agency in New York City years ago. And he came on my show. He's now doing his own. He's a chief communications consultant. And he mentioned just how different the earned media landscape is. And I was asking him about how different viral moments are these days. And he said, and this is for anyone who feels like their story is not being heard. His friend came to him and said, "Wow, did you see all the press around this viral thing that happened?" And he goes, "No." He looks, "Oh, there was a lot of press around that. It was everywhere." However, it was not in his everywhere.
And sometimes viral moments these days last for 10 minutes. But that big viral moment was meant for his friend and what he's focused on and his interests, not the interest of Joe. And so he was really talking to me about who is your viral moment for, for your audience? Going back to that key point, who are you trying to reach? What media doesn't make sense to reach out to? What channels should you be on? Not worrying about the everybody but his friend was so all about this major moment, had absolutely no radar for Joe. So think about whose radar do you want to be on, and what partnerships and connections do you need to make that happen?
Carrie Fox:
Amazing. Such a great place to end. Dana, as always, such a pleasure to connect with you and to learn from you, as I always do. And thanks so much for all the awesome work that you are doing.
Dana Snyder:
Thanks, Carrie. You too.
Carrie Fox:
And that brings us to the end of another episode of Mission Forward. If you like what you heard today, I hope you'll stop right now and give this show a five star rating wherever you are listening to this podcast. Maybe even forward it to a friend who you think would enjoy today's conversation. And of course, check out the show notes for all of the links referenced in today's show.
Mission Forward is produced with the support and wisdom of Pete Wright and the true story production team, as well as the wonderful Sadie Lockhart of Mission Partners. You can learn more about our work over at missionforward.us, and of course reach out to me anytime at carrie@mission.partners. Thanks for tuning in today, friend, and I'll see you next time.
