Less Voice, More Empathy

Here's a blog post I wish I'd have written. Mark at Queer Ideas takes on the concept of voice and tone in nonprofit communications. "I've come to the conclusion that the instructional approach that so many brand guidelines take to defining 'tone of voice' simply doesn't work when it comes to specifying how non-profits must use language," Mark says. "Most direction is either unnecessary or confusing."

He then goes on to examine some of the words we use in our in-house style guides or when talking about how to write fundraising and communications materials:

Positive: What's the point? I'm writing for a charity. I'm hardly going to be negative about what a donor can achieve with a gift. Neither am I going to present the challenge a charity faces as being insurmountable.

Honest: Cripes, lucky this was there otherwise I'd just lie about everything the charity does.

Respectful: And there I was just about to kick off with a long tirade of patronising and sarcastic abuse. Phew! That was a near miss.

On he goes, and the point is clear: words like "passionate," "caring," and "honest" are great sentiments, but they don't offer much practical guidance. They don't tell you how to craft your nonprofit's story, where to place the "ask" in a fundraising letter, or how long a piece of copy should be. Those are hard questions, and they need better answers than a simple feel-good word.

Mark suggests that the best thing you can do for your nonprofit's branding is to focus not on tone, but on empathy. Study what your audience reacts to; write for them. As we've discussed here before, nonprofit professionals are often very different people from donors. Sometimes the message we most enjoy writing isn't the one that resonates most with supporters. Jeff at Donor Power Blog takes it a step further: "If your belief, or theory, or intuition about fundraising is based on your own personal experience, you are wrong."

There are all kinds of great resources online for nonprofit writing and storytelling. We Are Media's storytelling module is a good place to start. I also love these videos of Ira Glass' candid thoughts on storytelling.

Today marks the beginning of TechSoup's Digital Storytelling Event, so be sure to check out everything the event has to offer. There's even a multimedia storytelling challenge, with the chance to win a Flip Video camera, an MP3 player, or a free GoldMail account.

Related

• Fundraising Facts
• Writing Without Fear of Libel
• Who Is the Hero in Your Nonprofit's Story?
• New Media, Old Media, and Your Nonprofit
• Should Your Nonprofit Have a Blog?
• Social Media and Poverty

Photo: Ryan Gratzer, CC license

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