San Francisco Opera is about to launch its 2010-11 Season, and (Mission Minded-designed) advertisements have already hit the streets. While there are a number of elements to the public marketing campaign, one of the most noticeable — and difficult to create — is the street pole banners.

At Mission Minded, we strongly believe that designing a successful street pole banner is like writing a great haiku:

If you say too much
You have said nothing at all
Brevity is key

Many organizations fall into the “Too Much Information” trap. They want to include sponsor logos, dates, times, phone numbers, and catchy copy. Others fall victim to small type. And still others ask the reader to think about too many things at once.

A great pole banner is simple. It introduces an idea and gives readers a single, clear way of responding. Take a look at the San Francisco Opera banner above for Puccini’s Madama Butterfly, above. Imagery and a single word from the title introduce the excitement of seeing one of the world’s best-loved operas. The URL is all that is needed to tell readers how to respond.

Moreover, the banner takes full advantage of the space available, allowing the word “San Francisco” to jump the space taken up by the pole. The result: Even readers driving at 30 miles per hour can still read the name and know what to do.

San Francisco Opera Street Pole Banner - Aida

The next time your organization sets out to create street pole banners, remember: Stay simple, clear, and easy to read. Give your audience a single clear step to take, and don’t confuse people with extraneous information.

Founding Partner, Jennie Winton will speak at the Development Exectutives Roundtable luncheon about how to create an annual report that grabs attention and woos donors instead of driving would-be supporters away.

Friday, August 13, 2010
12:00-1:30 p.m.
Lighthouse for the Blind
214 Van Ness Avenue
San Francisco CA 94102

Sign-up today!

Mission Minded will lead the popular webinar “Messages That Move: How to Write a Tagline That Gets Results” through the Colorado Nonprofit Association on August 17 at 1pm MDT.

If you’re a nonprofit communicator, this training is for you! In the 90 minute training, you’ll learn:

• How to make your tagline powerful
• Tricks of the trade
• Examples of the best and worst in nonprofit taglines
• Resources for writing a new tagline
• How good tagline writing can improve all your messages

This training is for you! Sign up today!

Jennie and I have been teaching nonprofits how to talk about their work for almost ten years now at Mission Minded. For the most part, that’s meant working with our clients to develop brand frameworks and key messages that tell the story of their work in a compelling away, based on our research into their organization and our own long experience with nonprofit marketing.

Occasionally, it’s meant getting up in front of a room and giving a presentation on one of our marketing guides. And now, we’re pleased to announce, it will mean something else: our new training program for nonprofit organizations.

The first training we’re offering is our new Minute Message Model™. Are you happy with the messages you’re putting out about your organization? If you feel like you could be doing it better, you’re not alone. Lots of organizations focus on the details of their programs when instead they should to be talking about the impact those programs have.

Our Minute Message Model training teaches you how to do just that — describe your impacts — in a way that works whether you have just a minute to convey the most important information about your work or ten minutes to fill in the details about your programs.

Through case studies, examples, and hands-on exercises, participants in our trainings gain a deep understanding of our tried-and-true message model. At the end of the session, they walk away with a set of messages they can share with their co-workers and board members to ensure that the whole organization is singing the same tune.

We understand that not every nonprofit organization can afford to hire us to build a set of messages for them. Our new Minute Message Model training is our way of sharing our know-how with a whole new set of deserving causes.

Our first open training is scheduled for September 14, 2010 in San Francisco. We’d love to see you there!

Around the world, organizations like CHPL, MRCD, and PoRUG are rejoicing. NPR and the Y have officially adopted shortened versions of their old names (National Public Radio and YMCA). Does that signal to the rest of the nonprofit world that they should follow suit?

It shouldn’t.

Most nonprofit organizations face an uphill battle to be known and understood by their most important audiences. Using initials or an acronym presents a barrier to understanding who you are and what you do.

Take BayCES, for example, an organization that believes every child has a right to a quality education. The name was understood only by insiders and ardent supporters. Every introduction required an explanation, which hampered the organization’s ability to achieve its mission.

With Mission Minded’s help BayCES has renamed itself National Equity Project. The full name explains who they are and what they do — they are an organization dedicated to ensuring an equitable education for every student in the country. And, they have resisted the urge to shorten the name to NEP. Doing so would only serve to obfuscate their important work.

Even major national nonprofit brands face this challenge. Ask yourself this: Which organization would I rather support, the SPCA or the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals? Which name paints a picture and has punch?

So Why Can They Do It?

NPR and the Y are special cases. For NPR, the three letter abbreviation is a standard practice in the world broadcast journalism. NPR isn’t competing with other nonprofits for attention; it’s competing with CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC and FOX for market share.

More importantly, NPR owns the airwaves. Most nonprofits have only a few opportunities to get people to know and understand their name. NPR can remind its listeners many times a day what the NPR brand stands for.

For the Y, the organization has had more than a century to build brand awareness for its shortened name. It is one of the best-known nonprofit brands in the world, and as such can marshal the resources needed to make such a move. Additionally, the original name is now so irrelevant that it’s comical. If being a young male Christian were still a litmus test for membership, the organization would lose most of its clientele.

So What to Do?

Choose a name with meaning and stick with it. If you need to shorten it, let the shortened name have meaning too. This means that an organization like American Heart Association should use its full name whenever possible and shorten it to “Heart” in casual conversation, rather than as “AHA.” The result will be greater understanding and support for the organization’s mission.