NonprofitEye

Birth of a Blog: Guerilla Marketing, Effective Use of Technology and Good Content Win the Day by pam ashlund A funny thing happened when I started using Technorati. All I wanted was a quick way to see who ( if ANYONE ) was linking to my blog. First, I had to sign up with one of these services and I picked Technorati because it was the first one I came across. Second, I then found out that I was right from the beginning, no one was linking to my site. Third, I decided to try my hand at a bit of self-marketing, which went as follows: Get my brother-in-law to link to my site Set up another dummy blog and link to myself Arm wrestle another friend to link to my site None of that had much of an impact (of course) so I moved on to some actual strategy: Add tags to my blog configuration on Technorati Add tags to my posts (this was painful and manual although I later found a script for it) Test the results - found I showed up in search engines a LITTLE bit more frequently Still no links (tap, ...

The Oxymoronic Challenge - More on the Nonprofit Identity Crisis by pam ashlund A nonprofit making a profit? marketing its brand? The first time I heard someone talk of “marketing our brand”, I thought “what on earth can we be marketing? We’re a non-profit, we’re not selling anything!. It seemed oxymoronic. But how wrong I was. In nonprofit accounting, I’m frequently asked by members of the for-profit world “what’s to account for if you can’t make a profit?”. Har Har. “But of course we can make a profit!” I want to shout, but I have to take these conversations slowly and carefully. Re-education is possible, but sometimes frustrating. So many myths to dispel, so many insights to articulate. Thinking about innovation today. First, what IS innovation ? The standard definition is: “the process of making improvements by introducing something new”. posted in my NetSquared blog, The Dearth of Nonprofit Innovative Thought : It's time to strike up a conversation backed by sound research, p...

Classic Nonprofit Resources: FASB 116 & 117* by Pam Ashlund Disclaimer: this is a "from the trenches" opinion piece written by a nonprofit finance director who lived through the transition from pre to post FASB Statements 116 & 117. Please click the "summary" and "status" links to read the full text of the statements and consult your independent auditor for final interpretation. Both Statements were effective December 15, 1994 for nonprofits with over $1 million in annual expenses and over $5 million in total assets. Statement No. 116 Accounting for Contributions Received and Contributions Made (Issue Date 6/93) [Summary] [Status] The statement radically changed (and standardized) the way nonprofits reflect income. Generally, the statement requires that contributions are recognized in the period received. Why radical? Pre-116, nonprofits received multi-year funding and reflected only the portion for the current fiscal year. The remainder was...

A Nonprofit Closes after being labeled High Risk: SAS 99 - A Nonprofit Case Study by pam ashlund “The worst lies are the lies we tell ourselves” Richard Bach Looking for how auditors assess risk? On July 31, 2006, The Washington Times reported that the Arlington Community Action Program (ACAP) was shutting its doors . Community Action Agencies have been providing poverty prevention programs since 1964 and Arlington was no exception, having just celebrated it's 40th anniversary and being awarded a commendation from Congress. What do we feel when one of our fellow nonprofits goes down? Worried that the situation will cast its dark shadow upon us? Sad that maybe it was unfair; or that they did good work; or that they didn’t know any better? In the end the best we can do is a careful post-mortem and then…learn from their mistakes…and hope that history won’t repeat itself. What happened at ACAP? First ask yourself “ what makes you feel safe ”? How about “ We’ve been in business for ove...

IT'S A NEW WORLD: ADVICE FOR NONPROFIT LEADERS by pam ashlund A Desktop Guide for Nonprofit Directors, Officers, and Advisors Sarbanes-Oxley and Nonprofit Management Technorati Tags: Compliance , Nonprofit , Nonprofit Trends , Sarbanes , Sarbox

WHISTLE-BLOGGING - PART II by pam ashlund Afterward to Whistle-Blogging article In April, a Google search found ten links to the phrase "whistle-blogging" and now (in August, 06) there are over 300. It hasn't made it to Wikipedia yet, but I bet it will be there by midnight. By the way, none of those links were to mine, and my blog host "Blogger" is owned by Google! My favorite? The Delaware Supreme Court Justice who basically ruled "don't sue 'em for defamation, blog 'em back". See the article . The topic is, as one of my friends would say, "deliciously complex". SIDEBAR - I love the Electronic Frontier Foundation ! They has posted the worlds first Electronic Guide to Legal Issues for Workplace Bloggers . SIDEBAR: blog words. Here are the ones that are new to me: vlogging (the video blog). These can be done in your car while driving (now that sounds smart!). ghostblogging - having your blog written for you and then taking the ...