Trends

As the results of Ditch Digital Dabbling: How Small Businesses + Nonprofits Can Master Online Marketing demonstrate, nonprofits need to take a deeper dive into online media. Well, an opportunity is knocking at your door.

I’m delighted with the recent Ernst & Young report, Thinking big: How to accelerate the growth of women-owned companies, which matches what I’ve found from talking with high-growth women entrepreneurs. With the number of women-owned businesses increasing yearly, accelerating their growth is important.

by Bruce Arbit

I have spent the majority of my professional career helping organizations of all shapes, sizes, and structures (for-profit, nonprofit and newer hybrids) raise money. That’s why I am particularly interested in the ongoing conversation about growing the sources of financial capital that support initiatives with a social/environmental benefit.

How nice it is to see politicians focusing on plans to rev up small businesses and recognizing the importance of small businesses to the economy and to communities. While I can’t predict the outcome , I can certainly cheer the intent.

I’m a long-time advocate of impact investing. It brings new money to the nonprofit world, supports social enterprises, and can provide services and products that would otherwise be unfunded or unresolved.

With online stores offering how-to videos, discussion groups, and a homey, we’re-among-friends shopping experience, how can small brick-and-mortar businesses compete?

Talking to Gen Xers and Gen Ys lately, I realize how dramatically e-commerce is changing retail business and customer service.

Opening up a store used to require renting space, furnishing the store, and working arduous hours. The last is still true but not the first two. Businesses are thriving without a physical location. In fact, many are able to exist because they skip the fixed costs and upfront investment of a brick-and-mortar store.

I try to practice what I preach so I keep an eye on my website metrics. And I’ve noticed some trends, the most notable being that people want easily accessed information about social media, aggregated in a useful collection. My most popular website pages were curated resources to help people learn about social media.

So you’ve done your homework, assessed your resources, and decided that your nonprofit has the enthusiasm and talent to make a for-profit venture work.

The economy being what it is, nonprofits are looking for new revenue sources. Starting a business to fund your good works is one option. This is the first of a 3-part series on evaluating such undertakings and making them work.