Shannon Cherry: Transforming Nonprofit Fundraising and Marketing

Tasha: Good morning. Can you please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit more about your non profit origin story?

Shannon: Hi, I am Shannon Cherry. I Began my career way too long ago. Well, I was the youngest, uh, television anchor and reporter in the country back in the late eighties, early nineties. And what I realized as I was doing these stories were the people with power and the people with money.

Shannon: Often got the news coverage, whereas the real stories, the ones that actually will make a difference oftentimes didn’t. So after a few years in news at an ABC affiliate, I moved over to nonprofit work and I’ve spent 20 years doing marketing and fundraising for nonprofits to help them find their voice and be heard.

Tasha: I love that. I love that. And what are you up to right now?

Shannon: Now I am a fractional fundraiser and marketer, uh, which means that I go into nonprofits pretty much as their development director, but because I’m so experienced, I don’t need the ramp up time and it’s more affordable than hiring what I call a junior fundraiser, someone who they, they need a development person, but they’re just.

Shannon: Starting out on their career. So they make a lot of mistakes. I come in, we build a plan and then in 12 months, they can continue to work with me or take this plan and move it forward with someone less experienced.

Tasha: I love that. I love the fractional movement. I think it’s fantastic. So favorite part of this work, what do you love about the nonprofit sector, your work as a marketer organizations that you’ve worked with today?

Shannon: Yeah, I think the thing is that. My values are based in justice and equity. I mean, I didn’t realize it till much later in my life. I have two daughters with autism. They’re 18 years old now, but almost 19 and they often. Are some of the reasons I do this because I see the injustices in the world, and I had that back when I was a reporter, but now it’s hit home a lot farther.

Shannon: So what I like doing is seeing that that passion that a nonprofit has the idea of making the world a better place for everyone, not just it might be one target market or one specific group, but really it’s about that. And I do that in a variety of ways, but I always have that lens on of how we can make things better for everyone because it’s the curb cut effect.

Shannon: I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of that, but if you know that you’ve built something for people with disabilities, like the curb cuts for wheelchairs that you see at the end of curbs, it also helps everybody else because it helps people with a lot of packages. It helps moms with strollers. It helps.

Shannon: Senior citizens who may need help walking across the street and taking that dip could be difficult. So I look for those things. And it’s always fun to see those in those nonprofits because most of them have it.

Tasha: I love that. And, you know, for me, some of what I think nonprofit doesn’t do all that well is educating.

Tasha: About what nonprofit is out in the world and what it does, but, you know, when all of a sudden we need the services, because I think the average person who maybe doesn’t work in nonprofit or has very little exposure, maybe doesn’t have a kid who needs support. You and I have connected on this before, you know, I have one kiddo with, you know, a variety of ADHD, motor sensory, things like that.

Tasha: It wasn’t evident until I was out there trying to find him the help he needs. You know, my partner and I are, are, Are well educated. We had the funding to go around and circumvent the system because the system was not ever designed for him and we paid for many things out of pocket. But I frequently so frequently look and go.

Tasha: Yeah. But what about people who are not in the position that we’re in? And, you know, when you need the curb, like you were talking about, do you ever need it right then? Right? It’s not until you notice That you need it that sometimes we become aware of some of these inequities that you’re talking about but nonprofits Are making it possible for everyone that when it’s your turn that you needed that potential curb, whether it’s, you know, when you’re in your twenties, that you maybe need supports with a wheelchair ramp, or what if it’s not until your eighties, it shouldn’t matter.

Tasha: It’s there for you to use and it’s there for anyone who needs it. And I think that’s a really powerful example that you’re sharing. And I love that. I don’t know if I’d, I’d heard it framed that way, but it totally resonates.

Shannon: I mean, there’s a lot of examples of this in the real world that we use just as neurotypical people, or neurotypical.

Shannon: Siri, for one, if you have an iPhone, Siri was actually invented by someone who wanted to help people with disabilities, and wanted them to be able to have something that they could communicate with in case they, especially communication disabilities, so they could talk if they were blind, they didn’t have to do that.

Shannon: So many of us now use Siri or something like Siri to get stuff done. So it’s amazing how things always end up, if they’re built for, built for somebody, even in the non profit world, they’re built to help somebody, no matter what. It ends up helping all of us.

Tasha: Great example. I always like to start off with the favorites because then I move into the challenges of this work.

Tasha: And, you know, it can be at an organizational level challenge. It can be as someone who’s worked for a very long time in the sector. What do you think are some of the greatest challenges facing nonprofits and non profiteers?

Shannon: Yeah, I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, but really it comes down to one word and it’s.

Shannon: It’s capacity. It’s not capacity building. It’s capacity. The problem is, um, you know, we can’t keep people in jobs in the nonprofit sector. They don’t pay enough. The problem is we more people want services than ever. It’s increased by like 70 percent in the past, since COVID more people need help. It’s a, and then we have boards who don’t understand their role and what they’re required to do and where, where they’re overreaching.

Shannon: And then we have funders who think that not paying for operational cost is good. So you come, it’s really about capacity and educating everyone about the problems our sector is facing. And, and. Understanding where we can make some differences and make change real change because we’re not going to be able to do complete our missions in the nonprofit world missions or even solve a problem if we need to.

Shannon: If we have all these hiccups along the way, I mean, who can do work, who can help people if you’re, you can’t hire staff because they’re getting, they’re making more money at McDonald’s and they are at the nonprofit.

Tasha: I don’t know if you’re part of nonprofit happy hour on Facebook, which is such an interesting and wild group to be a part of, but you know, there was people there going, I’m accessing the same services.

Tasha: My own nonprofit offers for my family because I’m not getting paid enough to not write like, like there’s something, you know, I don’t know if you read one of, uh, I remember as Michelle just wrote about incongruence and nonprofit work and this, you know, this mismatch of how we work internally and how things are run within teams.

Tasha: And like that unfairness that that the deep sense of like something moral, like there’s an immoral injustice feeling starting to rise, I think, and we kept a lid on it through this like martyrdom complex of nonprofit work for so long, but I don’t think it. It’s hard to watch the inequities of the rich getting richer and all of that and going, but what, this doesn’t make sense, but we’re subsidizing everything out there in nonprofit that used to be government run.

Tasha: And we accepted that, but I don’t think the acceptance is there anymore among staff or it’s really changing.

Shannon: I think as. Um, society is changing, you know, baby boomers are retiring and it’s called the silver tsunami, a whole, they’re all going to be going away soon. They’re retiring, they’re getting out of it.

Shannon: Baby boomers were taught how to, that they were dedicated and they stuck with it no matter what. Now I’m sort of in the middle, I’m a Gen Xer, but the other people down, you know, Millennials and they. Want to save the world, but they want to do it in their own way, and they want to do it in a way that is meaningful to them, not just what somebody says is the job.

Shannon: So, and I think that’s fair, and I’m glad that we’ve educated these other generations on what they should be asking for.

Tasha: Yeah, I agree. I, I technically fall in this like elder millennial, like there’s like a term for like the four years around my, my age range and I do see the millennials significantly younger than me.

Tasha: And I’m like, we’re a completely different, we’re a completely different breed because I absolutely, with friends among my own age, still have a lot of that, like. No, you work and you work and you work and the boundaries are very low. And, but I’m excited that there are people who the boundaries conversation is just.

Tasha: And it’s not something they’re going to gloss over and I’m learning from a lot of how they are working things and learning different ways to express your passion, right? And it doesn’t have to look the same as it always did. And yeah, I feel like the future of nonprofit is really exciting. And I understand that it’s also overwhelming and that systems changes.

Tasha: That’s it’s a big deal. And I don’t think the sector you said capacity earlier. The capacity in the sector for change is not, not great, right? So I

Shannon: think if you have, you look at our governments and if our governments take forever to change like silly rules and silly, you know, like we have laws on the books in the United States about slavery still, that you indentured servants.

Shannon: And that actually, even in. Liberal California, we have one about prisoners, people who are in prison, that they can, they can be in service to others, um, and not get paid for it. Like, they’re fighting fires in L. A. right now, those kind of things, so, and they don’t get paid for it. So, there’s a lot, if they can’t change, It’s a lot harder for the people getting their money, a lot of government money, to change.

Tasha: So, gonna shift it a little bit into peer support. You’ve been in this industry for a long time. What is peer support and engaging with others who are in non profit work as well? What has it meant to you?

Shannon: Yeah. So, it’s interesting. We talked, we jumped on this thing about Gen X.

Shannon: Gen X was raised to be completely, fiercely independent. That’s the one thing I can tell you is that we learned very early that, you know, our parents are at work all day. They, we got home from school and we can do what we can watch MTV, do whatever the heck we want it when there was an MTV. Um, we can do whatever the heck we wanted and, you know, got, and even get dinner on the table for the entire family.

Shannon: And I was getting out and I was like. 6th grade, 8th grade, 6th grade, 7th grade. That was my responsibility is when I came home, but I also had the freedom of I could go out all the time and no one asked where I was. No one cared because that was what that that’s how we were raised. So we were fiercely independent for me.

Shannon: I had that for a long time where I tended to silo in. I, I was not a big collaborator since I started this business. And since I found the hive, it’s really honestly been a game changer for me. I have met so many amazing peers and amazing people. Every person I talk to on the Hive, every, no matter if they’re a nonprofit leader, no matter if they’re thinking about going into nonprofit work, no matter if they are a consultant or they do something else, every single one of them has something to give.

Shannon: And I get so many ideas just by having it. I, like, the Hive chat is on my calendar no matter what. There’s only a couple times I take it off when I’m away. But other than that, it’s my thing and I love it. And I So many great things have happened because building this peer network, we comment on each other’s LinkedIn posts, which actually helps the algorithm for us.

Shannon: So those kind of things, we didn’t ask for it. People are doing it because what I am finding is the more we work together, the better we make change.

Tasha: I couldn’t agree more. It’s really special. I mean, I, I loved, I can’t even remember now how you ended up finding us, what the, like, you’ll have to tell me, like, what, how you found the hive, but you jumped.

Tasha: Right in with both feet, which I love. And you know, we have our quiet lurkers. I mean, you know, it’s a community of 1600 people, but I would say more like 200, 250 kind of fall into that power user kind of category. Some people have taken 65 conversations since October, 2023. It’s crazy, right? Like that’s an insane number, but there’s also lots that are just kind of quietly or tiptoe in or.

Tasha: You know, take a chat and then come back in two months. But you were like right in right from the beginning, which I deeply appreciate it.

Shannon: Well, I love it. I’m very lucky that someone referred me to you. Um, that I had just, she wanted to know what I was doing. She was starting out her freelance career and want to know how I was doing what I was doing.

Shannon: So I just, you know, okay, I’ll talk to you. I got time. And she told me about, And I was like, I’ve never heard of this. Is it like lunch club? Is it like that? And she’s like, no, it’s better. So there you go. And once I did it, it didn’t want, I was like, this is game changing.

Tasha: Yeah. Hey, it, you know, I, I truly believe, you know, the peer support piece and talking to others who’ve been in the industry, whether.

Tasha: You’re brand new, which we have lots of people who are quite new to the field or looking to go into the field. It’s been super interesting to see these people who are brand new to nonprofit as well. But they also bring a different training, a different mindset. They ask some really deep and probing questions of some of our.

Tasha: Members who have been in nonprofit like yourself for 20 years, that they’re probably the questions we all should be, we should be asking ourselves these questions, right? And they’re the ones who are going to be taking up the mantle of nonprofit over the next, you know, time frame. And, and so we, we do have to answer some of those questions.

Tasha: So I love, I love the combination of, of playing around with all the different people who come to the hive. Yeah, I do, too.

Shannon: I never know who you’re going to meet. And every single story is different. I mean, I met one person on a hive chat, Mike Lee, and he what he does actually helps. And it was an amazing thing because we were finding, trying to find dental care for people with autism is really difficult for some because it’s a very, as we all know, we all love the dentist and it’s a very sensory thing and it’s, but it’s even harder sometimes for people with autism.

Shannon: So he has a foundation that helps with that. And we were desperately looking for a new dentist for her because she turned 18 and the pediatric dentists are like, you know, we really. We really can’t work with her anymore. Yeah. And immediately I, I put out a call to him and he found someone like that and introduced us and got, they got her in in days.

Shannon: It was amazing. That’s awesome. And that’s Now he’s also working with my husband on a course to help dentists. My husband also works in non profit work and he is on the Hive as well, um, but he, but he, they’re building a course for dentists and dental personnel to understand autism better and people with communication disabilities.

Shannon: I love it.

Tasha: Hey, sometimes there’s just a little bit of serendipity there, right?

Shannon: It’s so cool. And I think he was like my first or second chat.

Tasha: This is so fantastic. Um, so, you know, appreciate all that you’ve done as a Hive member and how can people get in touch with you to learn more about your fractional fundraising services and marketing services?

Shannon: Yeah, well, my website is mynonprofitadvisor. com. There’s a whole bunch of free resources there you can grab. It’s, and they’re pretty easy. Um, you can also reach me via email. Hello at mynonprofitadvisor. com. Amazing. That’s fantastic. Thank you so much for doing this with me, Shannon. It’s always a pleasure.

Shannon: I love the hive. I can’t, I couldn’t, I couldn’t be the person I am today without it.

Tasha: Oh, you’re wonderful. Thank you so much.