Episode 42: Speakin' My Language How to Engage Multilingual Donors

In the nonprofit sector, it’s easy to think of the pool of donors as being limited. You end up returning to the same group time and time again. But is there a different pool of donors out there that you’re not reaching, perhaps because your organization isn’t reaching out to them with the right language or operating within the right cultural context?

Joining Steve for today’s episode is Adrian White Slagle, the Vice President of Strategic Marketing and Supporter Experience at Operation Smile, a nonprofit medical service organization that helps children born with cleft conditions. Tune in to hear Steve and Adrian discuss how to expand your donor base by engaging with multilingual donors.

Topics Discussed in This Episode:

• The changing demographics in America, including the rapid growth of the Hispanic population
• The large percentage of Hispanic Millennials in America
• The importance of engaging bilingual and multilingual donors on a cultural level
• The importance of Spanish in Hispanic culture, even among Hispanics who also speak English
• The process of implementing multilingual programs for donors
• The benefit of starting small and layering in more widespread multilingual efforts gradually
• The importance of understanding key cultural values when determining if a cause is relevant to a specific audience
• The benefits of starting with a digital campaign first in order to gather valuable quick data about the response

Resources:

Adrian White Slagle

Operation Smile

Blackbaud

Blackbaud - Twitter

Blackbaud - Facebook

Quotes:

“I think you can start out slow and small and just continue to layer on adapting from what you’re already doing, and that works.”

“If we’re not diversifying our audience, we’re just saying the same things to the same people, and at some point, they may move on.”

“We’re not reaching out to people who are sitting there waiting for us to start a conversation with them.”