← Nonprofit Nation with Julia Campbell
Nonprofit Nation with Julia Campbell
Building a Thriving Nonprofit Consulting Business with Mandy Pearce
00:41:20
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- [00:00]
Julia Campbell
Imagine nonprofit work transformed by purpose built tools. That would mean less guessing and more connecting, less admin and more impact, less stuck and more go. With the giving platform built for purpose, you don't have to imagine Bloomerang can help you raise more funds, retain more donors, save more time, and grow stronger relationships with your supporters so you can spend time on what matters most, your mission. Want to see how over 20,000 nonprofits are using Bloomerang to raise, retain and recruit more supporters? Well, take a free on demand tour of the giving platform today. Go to jcsocialmarketing.com bloomerang that's jcsocialmarketing.com B L O O M E R A N G okay, on to the show. Hello and welcome to Nonprofit Nation. I'm your host, Julia Campbell, and I'm going to sit down with nonprofit industry experts, fundraisers, marketers, and everyone in between to get real and discuss what it takes to build that movement that you've been dreaming of. I created the Nonprofit Nation podcast to share practical wisdom and strategies to help you confidently find your voice, definitively grow your aud audience, and effectively build your movement. If you're a nonprofit newbie or an experienced professional who's looking to get more visibility, reach more people, and create even more impact, then you're in the right place. Let's get started. Hello. Hi everyone. This is Nonprofit Nation with your host, Julia Campbell. And today we have a topic that I have never done on this podcast. I think that's a first. We're going to discuss how to build a thriving nonprofit consulting business with Mandy Pierce. And if you've ever thought about starting or growing a nonprofit consulting business, this episode is for you. So my guest, Mandy Pierce is the founder of Funding for Good, where she spent over two decades helping nonprofits build sustainable fundraising strategies. She also coaches aspiring and established consultants, helping them refine their business models and create profitable, purpose driven consulting practices. Today, we're going to talk about her journey, the biggest lessons she's learned, and some practical advice on how to attract clients, price your services, and create multiple income streams. We're also going to talk about the Nonprofit Consulting Conference coming up in September, which is really exciting and I hope to get there. But Mandy, welcome to the podcast. I'm so happy to have you here.
- [02:49]
Mandy Pierce
Thank you so much. I can't believe we've both been in this industry. Yes. In our own businesses. Both for 15 years.
- [02:55]
Julia Campbell
Yeah.
- [02:56]
Mandy Pierce
The first time we are connecting individually.
- [02:59]
Julia Campbell
Where are you based?
- [03:00]
Mandy Pierce
North Carolina.
- [03:01]
Julia Campbell
Okay. North Carolina. Okay. I'm in Boston. I know there's just so many conferences. There's pl. We probably crossed paths, like sliding doors or something. I'm sure, completely. But it's. It's just so wonderful to have you on the podcast and to be talking about this. I don't very often talk about how I built my business or build my business or what I do in my business. Not out of not wanting to. Just out of being so focused in the sort of the trenches in the day to day. So what inspired you to transition from working in nonprofits to launching your company? Funding for Good.
- [03:36]
Mandy Pierce
I got tired of having a boss.
- [03:37]
Julia Campbell
Yeah, I hear that very much.
- [03:39]
Mandy Pierce
That's the short of it. Got tired of having other people tell me what to do and how to do it. And I also got tired of being penalized for being productive. No, you have goals and objectives and you achieve them, but then you still have to sit behind the desk just because, you know, clock that eight hours in. And I'm like, I could be so much more productive in my own space, doing my own thing and serving more people and being more impactful. So that's what I did.
- [04:03]
Julia Campbell
Yeah. Tell me about Funding for Good.
- [04:05]
Mandy Pierce
We started as a grant writing company called Grant Cruise, and then a couple of years in, we're like, ooh, we have pigeonholed ourselves. So we decided to make it a more broad title with Funding for Good. And we do. At this point, we're really known for strategic planning, leadership development, development coaching, and consulting, and then helping nonprofit consultants start and grow their businesses. So really, there's two kind of sides of the company and the nonprofit side. I mean, we can do lots and lots of other things, but we really focus on strategic planning, leadership work, and development coaching. Because I was always development director, which is my passion, and my lead consultant has always been an executive director and program director. So between us and all the other folks we work with.
- [04:48]
Julia Campbell
Yes.
- [04:49]
Mandy Pierce
Yeah.
- [04:50]
Julia Campbell
Have you always done this kind of coaching for consultants, or was that something that sort of evolved after you'd been in business for a while?
- [04:57]
Mandy Pierce
Yes. I don't think I. I tell people. I don't think I could have done this a decade ago because I was still learning a lot of things the hard way. I'm like, I've learned so many things the hard way because, like, as.
- [05:09]
Julia Campbell
As we do. Yeah.
- [05:10]
Mandy Pierce
When we were coming up 15 years ago, you didn't have all the groups, all the coaching, all the LinkedIn, all.
- [05:16]
Julia Campbell
The technology that we have now, and.
- [05:18]
Mandy Pierce
It'S like, I didn't even know all those things. I'm sure they existed somewhere. I think Sandy Reese is the first person I met that I talked to that did any kind of coaching for consultants. And I don't think. I don't know that she does anymore, but, like, she's the first person I ever met. And, gosh, that was like the year before I went full time with the business, right? So. So I was. I was like, I didn't even know that was a thing. So, yeah, I started doing the consulting work with consultants because I was like, so many people should be able to live the life, work, balance that they want, make the money they want, and do it without learning everything the hard way. And I'm like, there's so much work to go around, and I want to tell people how to do it quickly because I didn't know all of that. I learned all of it the hard way. It can be so much easier than. Than the way that we did it coming up. And I want to share that with people. So that's why we started doing the consulting work.
- [06:13]
Julia Campbell
I remember when I started my business, I have not changed the name of it. It's still J. Campbell Social Marketing. It's like the dumbest name of all time. But my husband went on vistaprint and got me some business cards, and it was the sweetest thing. And I went to a chamber of commerce meeting. I don't know why. Like a local chamber of commerce. Wine and cheese. I mean, it's all real estate agents and insurance people. There were no nonprofits there. I had no idea what I was doing. Oh, my gosh. I. I have so much advice that I feel like, yeah, I could give, too. So I love what you're doing, but when you started funding for good, how did you land your first few clients? So let's talk about, like, maybe someone that's just starting out. I know I have a lot of consultants that listen to the podcast that are pretty established, but, you know, we're always searching for clients. But if you're. If you want to dip your toes in, you know, what was your strategy for landing those first few clients?
- [07:13]
Mandy Pierce
So, you know, when you're in the nonprofits, you're always networking. You're always at some function, event, educational thing, whatever. And I had had so many people reaching out to me over the years to say, can you help me with this? Can you teach me that? Can you grant write for us? Can you whatever. And I would do stuff on the side, but when I knew I was going to go full time, when I had the plan for my exit Date. I started really cultivating, I don't know, six or seven of those people and letting them know what I was going to do and would they be interested and just sort of having those conversations. And I already had probably three or four clients that were ready to sign on the dotted line the moment that I was no longer employed with someone else. That's kind of how I did that. Life gave me a curveball and said, you know, we're going to. We're going to do this six months earlier than you're prepared to do it. So my brother gave me a loan. I had $8,000 to my name in the bank the day that I went full time and ended up leaving my job six months earlier because of a horrible, like, ball situation. It was just nightmarish, which was fine, and I left in a good way, but the situation itself had been horrible. And so, you know, that's where I started. And I said, how much do I have to make a day to pay my bills? Not to do anything extra, not to go out to eat, not to anything. Just pay my bills and get by. And I needed to make $3,000 a month, which translated to roughly a hundred dollars a day. So for the first couple of years, it was literally a printed calendar. And I would mark down days like, oh, I got a $300 webinar. There's three days. And like, that kind of thing. That's where I started.
- [08:50]
Julia Campbell
Mandy, that is so funny and horrifying about your boss situation, because I had a very similar experience. So I was nine months pregnant, and I knew that I wanted to leave just because my workplace was so toxic. But I worked at a university, and the benefits are spectacular. So what I was going to do is take the. Whatever meager two, three weeks, maybe four weeks that I got from maternity leave, which I thought was amazing, and then work for probably maybe another six months. But tried to do what you did, like, try to figure out how I was going to transition to full time while, you know, still, like, putting money in the bank and things like that. But I ended up being laid off, like, while I was Emmett's pregnant. I mean, it was a whole thing, so it was the best thing that ever happened to me. But I. I think a lot of us that started in consulting, we. It's not like we graduated college and said, we want to be a nonprofit consultant. We worked in the trenches for a while, really had a bad experience, or we decided we didn't want a boss anymore and. And then jumped right in without knowing. And something I wanted to ask you is. I think where a lot of nonprofit consultants struggle is finding their niche. I love what you said about listening to the questions that people ask you. That's how I started off in social media and digital marketing, because 15 years ago, I was like a young, fresh, you know, Right. Like, on Facebook, on LinkedIn, doing all the things, and people kept asking me, oh, should we have a Facebook page? It was just becoming a thing. Should we be on these channels? How should we be using them? Should we be doing email marketing? Should we have a blog? And I had a blog for a very, very long. I still have a blog, actually, but I started out with a blog. So listening to those questions that people are asking you, and if it's something you enjoy giving advice on, like, trying to figure out how to monetize it. So I think, you know, for. What's your advice for people struggling to find their unique niche? And, like, how did you find yours?
- [10:49]
Mandy Pierce
I did. What? Paid the bills to start.
- [10:53]
Julia Campbell
Yes. I did some grant writing as well to start. Because it paid the bills.
- [10:58]
Mandy Pierce
Yeah. Because I didn't know that I could do the things that I enjoyed. And so now when I work with consultants, I let them. Like, it's always funny. I. I use this one example the most. There's a girl that came through our boot camp, and when she started, she's like, I really want to start a business. I think I'm gonna have to do. Like, as soon as she said that, I was like, oh, no. She's like, I think I'm gonna have to do grant writing. And I was like, why? She's like, because I think that's the thing people are going to come to me for. I'm like, okay, well, let's put that in one basket. And let me just ask.
- [11:23]
Julia Campbell
Yes.
- [11:23]
Mandy Pierce
What's the thing you enjoy what you like to do? What do you want to get up to do every day? She was like, I love copywriting. And I'm like, seriously? Like, if you could see my face right now. Everybody.
- [11:33]
Julia Campbell
So many people do not like that.
- [11:34]
Mandy Pierce
Everybody needs it. Because nobody wants to do it. Right. Because nobody's like, I want to get up to copyright today. She loves it. She also loves SEO strategy. And I'm like, okay, so first of all, you can totally have a business doing that, and you will have so many clients. She's like, do you think so? I know so. So we completely. In her bootcamp, she had not started her business yet. She started with me. We worked together for 60 days, and she said, okay, this is my dream. I want to have a business where I can sell my house in New York and move to Sicily full time with my husband and live there and work part time, making a full time salary. And I'm like, all right, we have goals. That's good. 18 months after we started her business, she went through boot camp. Twice after she started her business, she had full time clients working part time. And in the 18th month, she sold her house in New York. They moved to Italy. She just got her citizenship last month. She's passing the driving test right now, which Italy is a ginormous, like, nightmare. If you ever go online, I've seen.
- [12:39]
Julia Campbell
Movies, I saw White Lotus.
- [12:42]
Mandy Pierce
She is now officially rejecting clients because she's at capacity and she doesn't want to work anymore.
- [12:47]
Julia Campbell
Like, she's working with, living the actual dream.
- [12:50]
Mandy Pierce
Yeah, it's like part time work, but making all the money she wants because there's also like a limited amount you can make in Europe. It's like, I don't know, $90,000 or something. And so she's there and it took her less than two years to do it. And I was like, great. She doesn't have to write grants, she doesn't have to take those clients. And so, you know, if I had had me back in the day, I might not have had to do a lot of the things I did over the years and learned so many things the hard way. But, you know, it took me getting to where I am to realize I love helping people start and grow businesses. Like, I've had numerous businesses in my life. Like, I started teaching tennis lessons when I was in high school because I was like, I like to make money, I like to do the thing. And then I taught private swimming lessons and then, you know, all the different things. And so I've always been kind of entrepreneurial, but my mom was an entrepreneur. She had her own businesses. I got to watch her work from home and do her stuff. And so that is my passion point. Now, Funding for Good does lots of other things and I'm involved in a lot of that. But the thing I get up for is helping people start and grow their consulting businesses.
- [13:50]
Julia Campbell
I love that because you know how much freedom and happiness it can give you. Certainly there's a lot of stress. There's a lot of people that are listening to that and saying, oh my gosh, I can never get there. That is not my. I can't get there. How do I get there? How is this possible? The other struggle that I've seen that I struggle with as well, is this limiting belief that we can't charge what we're worth? Or like, how do we figure out how to price our stuff? And how do we stop shortchanging ourselves? Because we feel like we're working for nonprofits so we can't charge as much or we can't, you know, we need to over deliver and over promise all the time.
- [14:29]
Mandy Pierce
So we have so many things we talk about around this. We talk about how to write a scope of work, how to avoid scope creep, contract considerations that help cover you so you can say no. All the different things about how you work with a client to help them understand their deliverability. One of my favorite things that I say to people is I can't be more concerned about your fill in the blank than you are about your application, about your report, about your whatever. The thing is, right, because some people get so obsessed with. But they didn't do this thing, they didn't implement this thing. They haven't sent me their thing to review. They haven't met the deadline. And I'm like, yeah, you so upset about that. Like you've given them what you're supposed to do. Yeah. About their success than they are like, that's not our job. And until we get to that point and we understand and accept that and stop stressing about it, then that's a piece we have to like, have a mindset shift around. The other thing is the nonprofit is your client, but nonprofit is not your business model. You know, so the other, the big, big thing, that is a mindset shift for a lot of folks. I didn't have this problem, problem issue, mindset, whatever you want to call it. But a lot of people do. We come from the sector and we get paid a small amount of money and then we leave and we're like, I can't charge more than that.
- [15:42]
Julia Campbell
Right.
- [15:42]
Mandy Pierce
Because this is what we're not thinking. So let's say that you're making a salary, you're getting paid hourly, right? Most of the time people are going to start their consulting company and think, I've got to charge hourly because people want to know how long it's taking me to do a thing. I'm like, no, first of all, you need to project base your billing. But second of all, let's just say you're doing hourly and you're like, oh, I can't charge more than $25 an hour. Okay, well look at this. You charge a small amount an hour, but now you have to pay your taxes. Now you have to pay your. Now you have to pay your overhead, all those things. So by the time you take that out of a small hourly amount, you're not making anything. Whereas when you worked for someone, you didn't have overhead, they paid your insurance, they paid your workman's comp, they paid, you know, taxes came out. Now you have to do all of that. So if you're not charging at least $50 an hour, and that's, I'm saying, like, super, at the least, that's fairly low. You are not bringing anything home. And that just doesn't account for what is your overhead. Are you traveling or you do have materials you have to purchase? Do you have a lot of software that you're using, working with your clients? And what are your taxes? Everybody's got a different tax bracket. If you're married, your tax bracket might be different than if you're single. How much are you bringing in that's going to change your tax bracket? You know, there's so many considerations. But again, please hear me when I say if you're not at least charging $50. And I'm just saying that, it's like.
- [17:03]
Julia Campbell
Can $50 buy eggs right now? I don't think I can.
- [17:07]
Mandy Pierce
People are always saying that. Like, I was like, I have a dealer and she drops off my eggs once a week because eggs are stupid. Yeah, it's crazy. But anyway, so we really work with people to understand that. And, and here's the other thing. When you charge hourly and you get better at what you do and you become more efficient, you are now worth less. You're making less, you're bringing home less, you're being devalued because of your efficiency. So if you project, build, you don't have that problem. Right. It's like the guy that comes to your house to mow your grass and he's like, it's going to cost you $60. I'm going to mow, I'm going to trim, and I'm going to blow your grass. Great. Do I care if it takes him 30 minutes or an hour? As long as the deliverable is what I agreed to for the amount that.
- [17:50]
Julia Campbell
I agreed to, and I get that time back. That's what's so important. That's what my husband does not understand about lawn care. I want to get that time back. I don't want to spend Saturday and Sunday breaking leaves.
- [18:01]
Mandy Pierce
And so if it's worth what you're paying, as long as it's within the deliverables, that whoever said they're Going to give it to you, Gives it to you. It shouldn't matter how long it takes you. If I give you an amazing grant application that you can submit and potentially get money from. And it took me an hour and I charged you $2,500 versus it took me 10 hours and I charge you $2,500. Why does it matter to you? So there's a little mindset thought for you for the day, whether you're ready to make the shift or not. That's your thought?
- [18:29]
Julia Campbell
Yes. Okay, so that was a question that I had on the list. What's your take on hourly versus project based pricing? Do you think we should start off hourly and then do project based once we have some testimonials? Or how. How should we start this?
- [18:44]
Mandy Pierce
I think everyone should do project billing.
- [18:46]
Julia Campbell
That's just. Yeah, I agree 100% agree.
- [18:48]
Mandy Pierce
The only thing that we do hourly billing for is a consultation on demand. You can go to a website and book an hour with me and you're going to pay for it right there and that's what I'm going to charge you for.
- [18:57]
Julia Campbell
Yes.
- [18:58]
Mandy Pierce
Beyond that, everything is project build.
- [19:00]
Julia Campbell
100%. I completely agree. And I, when I started out doing this, I was doing hourly. It was impossible to manage, it was impossible to keep track of. Some of my clients have, like I work with Boston Public Schools and the way they work with contractors is they have to pay hourly. But so we just estimate, you know, we just estimate a number of hours and it's still like the deliverables will be done no matter what. So you might have some clients that unfortunately have to work that way because antiquated systems or something. But project deliverable pricing. Absolutely.
- [19:34]
Mandy Pierce
How do you figure out your pricing?
- [19:36]
Julia Campbell
How do you figure it out? I mean, I still struggle with it.
- [19:40]
Mandy Pierce
Well, this is where we start with.
- [19:42]
Julia Campbell
People less than I did.
- [19:43]
Mandy Pierce
But we. Right. We ask a couple of initial questions. What do you have to make? Yes, that's the first question. What do you have to absolutely make in the year to do what you need to do? And some people are like, I don't have to make anything because my spouse pays for everything. Okay, great. Or I got a trust fund. I don't really have to make anything. I just do this because I like it. Okay, great. You're the, you're not the norm. That's fine. What do you have to make? Figure out that number. What do you want to make? Figure out that number. And this is obviously net after expenses. What do you want to bring home after you've paid your bills and then how many hours a week do you want to work? And when I say work, I mean billable hours because you're doing work you're not getting paid for. Like right now, yes, you are recording a podcast with me and I'm not paying you to be here. So you're growing your business, right? You're working on your business, you're not working in your business right now.
- [20:29]
Julia Campbell
Right.
- [20:30]
Mandy Pierce
So how many hours billable do you want to work a week? And then how many weeks a year do you want to work? When you have those pieces of information, it is easy to determine what your hourly rate should be to reach your goals. And if your desire doesn't align with what you're saying, like you're like, oh, there's just no way I can do that without charging 500 an hour. With the number of hours you want to work, well then you either have to work more hours or you have to be willing to make less. So once you know that information, it's pretty easy to figure out from there.
- [20:58]
Julia Campbell
So how do you strike the balance of working on versus working in your business?
- [21:04]
Mandy Pierce
I think first of all you have to be aware that that exists. You have to be like, oh, I'm working 40 hours a week but 15 of those are not billable. Right? Because people are like, but I work.
- [21:13]
Julia Campbell
I'm working on my website, I'm working on my email.
- [21:15]
Mandy Pierce
Yeah, you have to schedule time for that and realize how much time it's going to take. And for you and your personality, communication style, business, whatever, determine do you need to network in person? Do you like to network online? Do you need to market and if so, how. So those things kind of help determine how much time you're going to need to spend on those things. And then saying, what are your must haves? As a consultant? Like for me and my entire team, we've tried very hard to say we are not communicating after 5pm and if we do, it should not be work related unless it is blood or flood. If it is emergency, then you know I will call you. Otherwise, if you see my phone, if you see my name on your phone after five, you know, I'm just going to be like, hey, how are the kids? Hey, what's going on? Whatever. So that's very important is setting your own boundaries and saying, you know, I've talked to consultants who are like, yeah, I start every morning doing meditation so I don't turn my phone on until 9:00am or 10:00am or whatever. I, I'm personally working On Mondays this year. I set that up.
- [22:18]
Julia Campbell
Amazing.
- [22:19]
Mandy Pierce
I. I chose. I was like, I'm going to take a day that is during the work week so I can get stuff done.
- [22:24]
Julia Campbell
Yes.
- [22:25]
Mandy Pierce
Running errands, whatever. And Friday is not that day. So I don't work on Mondays this year, and I don't have meetings on Friday. So I get work done in the office, but I'm not scheduling a single meeting on Fridays this year unless it's personal. So Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday are balls to the wall from 8 to 5. But then I have the flexibility that I need to live the life that I want the rest of the time. And I also said this year, which again, not everybody can say this, especially in your first year of business. Took a while to get here. I'm not traveling this year for work. First year in 15 years. I'm not going to conferences. I'm not presenting at conferences. I have one client trip for the entire year. And it's because I. I agreed to it last year before I made this statement because my body was like, we're done. I've had so many health issues because of travel and stress and adrenal fatigue and all the things. And I was like, I just have to have a year where I can eat meals at my house and sleep in my bed and be with my family and not have to pack up and go to the airport.
- [23:22]
Julia Campbell
Yes. Oh, man. I. Unfortunately, I'm not traveling this year. It's not my choice, but due to health issues. But I completely agree. I remember when Covid hit and that was supposed to be my busiest travel year ever. And having that year, of course, it was a very stressful year. But having that year to not be on planes. And of course, everything is always delayed and your bag is lost and you have to check in and you can't get your travel is just a horrific nightmare all around. But it was very interesting to have that time to just reset. I love that piece about really knowing your boundaries. So speaking of working on your business, what about marketing and networking? Like, how. How can we work strategically to attract our ideal clients? You know, going to conferences is one thing, but, like, what are some other ways that you've found and how are you doing marketing and networking in the year of no travel?
- [24:20]
Mandy Pierce
Well, okay, again, we're looking at a company that's been around for 15 years. Like, we have access our mailing list at the. Over the course of time, we have like 90,000 contacts. Right now, we have about 13,000 that are active.
- [24:32]
Julia Campbell
Yeah.
- [24:33]
Mandy Pierce
That we mail regularly. And then we have almost 2,000 on the consulting list side. So, you know, we do regular communications, we create content, we have our YouTube channel, we do podcasts occasionally. I'm not like a huge podcaster, but occasionally. And you referred to me by Kate, so obviously I was like, yes. And we're talking about a subject that I love. Yeah. And so we do all of that. We have our conference, so I get to network with a lot of people there. We built. So we also have a group called the Hive, which is our online nonprofit consulting networking community. So it's a membership based community, but we've gotten to know each other really, really well because we're not trying to be the biggest, we're trying to be a real community. So we build resources in there because it's not like all grant writers or all this or that. It's everybody. We have special event planners and accountants and people that do marketing and cybersecurity specialists and copywriters and grant writers and strategic planners and board developers and all the things. So if someone comes in and was like, hey, I've got a client who needs this. We have a group of people that we've gotten to know to be like, hey, are you interested in partnering? Or hey, can I send a referral to you? Or whatever. And so for me, I think a lot of people have networking communities now. There's a lot of them to choose from, depending on if you're in a particular field or you want a particular format, or you have a particular culture that you're wanting to experience. And so that's been a way that didn't exist years ago that I've been able to continue networking and then I think building really solid partnerships. And for me, that is not just on paper, not just emails occasionally, but it's like really getting to know people and really taking time to build relationships, which is really hard when you're not in person with people like we used to be all the time. But when it's intentional, I find that it is meaningful. And people like, I've spent years building relationships with Kate and I feel like I know her, I can pick up the phone and call her. I feel like I know enough about her personality, like, not just work related. And so when she sends me a referral, I'm like, oh, yeah, absolutely. And I invest in that. Right. As opposed to somebody who I've never met before that's like, hey, I think you should meet this person. And I'm like, you know, like, it's just awkward. And so for Me, that's been huge. So it's been building a network and being very intentional about where I'm spending my time and energy cultivating relationships. And those things take a lot of resources and a lot of time and thought, you know, oh, yeah.
- [27:04]
Julia Campbell
Oh, my gosh. Yeah. So go deep. I completely agree. I think people ask me all the time, yeah, how do you do so well, marketing? How do you have so many connections? How do you do it? And I think just being intentional about it. For the last 15 years, the one piece of advice that I would have for consultants is just start before you're ready. Like, I started my email list before I was ready, actually way later than I should have. I should have started growing my email list right off the bat. But I was so focused on my blog and focused on, like, other things. But that email list is so crucial and I wanted. I want to jump into beyond, like one on one consulting. What are some profitable income streams that you think consultants should explore?
- [27:47]
Mandy Pierce
I think part of that depends on your personality and what you find joy in. So, like, I wouldn't enjoy producing a podcast, enjoy having the conversations occasionally as a guest, but that wouldn't be a passion point for me.
- [28:00]
Julia Campbell
Yes.
- [28:00]
Mandy Pierce
So you could have a podcast and you can make money on sponsors and different things with that. But, you know, there's webinars, there are evergreen courses, there are templates you can sell on your website, there are speaking engagements you can be paid for, educational opportunities to present in other places that you can be paid for. There's consulting, there's coaching, there is ongoing retainer work. I mean, there's like endless ways you can write a book, you can write an ebook, you can write a paperback book, you could. We had a DVD series at one point that tells you how long we've been doing this. You know, you could have events, you could have a conference like we're doing now. There are literally endless ways that you can bring in revenue for your company. You have to determine what the things are that bring you joy. And sometimes you won't know till you try them and realize, ooh, yeah, that did not bring me joy.
- [28:47]
Julia Campbell
I also wish I hadn't waited so long to do my first online course because people have been asking me. Now my courses are about social media, so a lot of them can't be evergreen because things change so much. There are a couple, I think, that I could do evergreen, but I like to run them live to build that community and to really, you know, get people talking one on one. And then, you know, Sell the recordings. But I do what I think is just people think it has to be perfect. It does not have to be perfect. I mean, I remember my first course. It was not perfect. It was, you know, I was used to doing webinars and I've been speaking online and speaking in person. But just, yeah, figure out, you know, what you want to do, launch it and try a lot of new things, you know, And I don't recommend switching gears every three months or something, but I would say if there's, you know, a piece of your advice that you can, you could write a book, maybe you could, you know, you could definitely do a one off webinar on Zoom. I mean, sell it for seats for 47 bucks. Whatever. Whatever it takes. So what I did a lot of was I looked at what other people were doing. So I kind of looked at like Beth Cantor, Kivi Laroe Miller, Sandy Reese does a lot of online stuff, like Tammy Zonkar. Like, I looked at a lot of other people and saw what they were doing. And I actually took Amy Porterfield's course online. What was it? Courses that convert or something like that. And that was amazing for me because I did not know the first thing about building a course. I had no idea what I was doing. So getting that coaching or like, coaching from you, Mandy, or professional development that you might need. So you're not just reinventing the wheel, but you have those other profitable income streams.
- [30:28]
Mandy Pierce
Absolutely. And I think, you know, a bit of that marketing goes into, like, do you have lead magnets?
- [30:35]
Julia Campbell
Yes.
- [30:36]
Mandy Pierce
And how well are they done and are you ever updating them? Like, I have my first lead magnet on my website for like seven years.
- [30:43]
Julia Campbell
Oh, my God. I just wrote down update lead magnets. I know, I do. Struggles real.
- [30:48]
Mandy Pierce
As you explain, expand your business. Like, again, we started out with grant writing, so that's what our first lead magnet was about. But as we started doing more and more and more strategic planning, we have a strategic planning lead magnet. And then as we started doing more and more in consulting, we have a consulting lead magnet. You know, like, you don't have to have 20 lead magnets, but if there's things you want people to find you for and you want to be the expert, you have to give them a way to access it, whether it's a video or a template or a survey or educational booklet or whatever it is. So that's also an important piece in getting your name out in the world, because those are things you can share that other people can share that are usually Free.
- [31:27]
Julia Campbell
So what is the tech must haves? Like maybe you can tell us if you want about like your tech stack. But what are some of the tech must haves that you need when you're starting out or you want to grow?
- [31:40]
Mandy Pierce
Well, you're going to hate my answer for my tech stack because mine's going to be Ann, who's my web developer.
- [31:47]
Julia Campbell
Oh, that's fine. I love that. I don't do my own website.
- [31:50]
Mandy Pierce
Yeah, I don't do most of my own tech. You need a website and all the things that talk to it. So if you're selling things, you need all the widgets and plugins that make it commit, communicate with your stripe or something. Yes. Or you know, the platforms that take your orders. Like we use Woocommerce, we have stripe as a payment. Woocommerce takes the order. Then we have formidable forms that will actually house where people fill in the information for the actual order. And then we have pop up pages that do like thank you pop ups or redirect. I mean all these things are widgets or pop ups. So just to do an order you've probably got six or seven things. Right. And if it's an order that's for a webinar that's coming up, then we have to use Zapier to communicate with Zoom, to get the person that ordered into Zoom without them having to register themselves.
- [32:39]
Julia Campbell
Zapier is the best invention of all time.
- [32:42]
Mandy Pierce
I don't know how to use it, but we use it all the time as a company. Yes. And I mean, again, that's just one tiny thing that we do. There's so much tech that we have. Honestly, I just, I couldn't even tell you. I would have to call Ann and be like, Ann, what are all the things we use?
- [32:58]
Julia Campbell
What do you use for your email list?
- [33:00]
Mandy Pierce
I use ActiveCampaign.
- [33:02]
Julia Campbell
Oh, is that what you use for your date? Do you have a CRM? Is that your CRM?
- [33:05]
Mandy Pierce
Yeah.
- [33:06]
Julia Campbell
Okay.
- [33:06]
Mandy Pierce
It's emails, it's all the things. But what I will say is I started with mailchimp and I used the free version until I got to about 3,500 people on my list. And then I moved to a platform where I could do funnels and segmenting and tags and all the things which we definitely needed. And you have to make sure that that communicates with your website and all the other technology you're using. It's very expensive. They, they upped the price by almost 50% last year. They almost doubled it from where it was out of nowhere for no reason. I was like, what the. But anyway, once you get in with as many contacts and stuff in history as I have, you don't want to switch platforms. They obviously know that. But again, you're paying by the contact. So we're only paying by active contacts. And so we want to make sure we're constantly cleaning up our systems so that we're not constantly keeping people on who are inactive. So we have a funnel process for that that basically runs a report every month and after people are inactive for five months, it removes them from the system. Well, gives them an option to stay on, but if they don't respond to that email then it removes them so we can reactivate them if we have removed them so we can give them an opportunity to reengage later. But you know, there's lots, there's so many things that I, yeah, I think.
- [34:20]
Julia Campbell
I started out with a WordPress website because I wanted a blog. I still have a WordPress website. And then I started out with constant contact for my email list. Now I use ConvertKit, which I think is now called Kit. Same reason I wanted more functionalities and labels and funnels and things. I love ConvertKit kit, whatever it's called now.
- [34:43]
Mandy Pierce
Like I love all the metrics but I'm a development director by heart so.
- [34:46]
Julia Campbell
I used freshbooks until I finally hired a part time like an accountant. They're not even part time. I, they do, I don't even know. They just do like probably just a few hours for me. It's not like I have millions of dollars going through them, but they just were like, you have to go to QuickBooks like what are you doing? So then I went, they migrated me over to QuickBooks but I kind of manage it with them. So I would say like QuickBooks email marketing. I don't have a CRM. Like I just have QuickBooks which kind of acts like my CRM. And then I use Teachable for my courses. So yeah, Teachable is expensive.
- [35:23]
Mandy Pierce
We have learndash.
- [35:24]
Julia Campbell
Learndash. Okay, yeah, yeah, Teachable is expensive but it's the one I started off with and it's the one that I just know how to use and I love. And now they have like membership capability and they have all these different capabilities. So I'll probably stay with Teachable. If you are one of my teachable students, shout out to you, I love you. But yeah, it's really like, it can be very minimal. But yeah, if you're doing E commerce and things like that, you need to set it all Up. But I would really say website. A way to communicate with your email list. Some way to send invoices. I do all of my contracts in Google Docs and just put them through DocuSign.
- [36:03]
Mandy Pierce
I use Dropbox Sign. But yeah, yeah, mine are all Word. I put them in a PDF, send them off.
- [36:09]
Julia Campbell
Yes.
- [36:09]
Mandy Pierce
Editable templates.
- [36:10]
Julia Campbell
People think it has to be so, so confusing. They just overthink it. It's like the thing is, just get it done and the client doesn't care. Like, literally, they don't.
- [36:20]
Mandy Pierce
Here's your hack for if you're new and you're trying to save money. Because we don't have a lot of money for all the things that we're talking about right now. What we did was we would go. So these are the ones that were available at the time. So this will tell you how old this was. Dropbox Sign didn't exist. So it was hello Sign, I think.
- [36:37]
Julia Campbell
Yeah, I think it was hello Sign.
- [36:39]
Mandy Pierce
And then there was DocuSign and then there was one other one, and I can't remember the name of it. So we had an account on each.
- [36:44]
Julia Campbell
One, the free ones, until you. You. Yes. Oh, my gosh.
- [36:49]
Mandy Pierce
Until I needed the next three. And then once I got to where I was doing more than like eight or ten a month, I was like, okay, now I'm gonna go to Dropbox Sign. Because we were already paying for Dropbox.
- [36:57]
Julia Campbell
That is. Came out amazing. I did that for so long, I'd create like fake Gmails so that I could make more accounts. It was like, okay, at what point do I just pay the $9 a month or whatever it is. That is so funny. So I'm sure all the consultants out there that are all laughing because I'm sure we've all done that little hack or you like, hit the limit at mailchimp or Constant Contact. And that's when you clean your list and you're like, okay, these people. Oh, my gosh, the things we do for money. Anyway, we. So we're hitting time, but I want to know what's next for funding for good. And I also really want to hear about that conference coming up in September. How can we find out about it? Go to it, Attend it. I know you want to keep it small, but tell me all about the conference.
- [37:40]
Mandy Pierce
So we have the. The conference will hold 200 people. We are currently at 25% capacity, and we have not started marketing it yet for this year. So we start the. The second week in April. That's when we will start officially marketing we're trying to fill up as many seats as possible before the early bird rate ends, which will be May 31st.
- [38:00]
Julia Campbell
So, okay, I will drop this podcast before May 31st. So everybody go to the link in the show notes or what's the URL.
- [38:07]
Mandy Pierce
Yeah. Nonprofit consulting conference.org and we are excited. It's going to be in Asheville, North Carolina, this year at the Sierra Nevada Brewing Company. So the airport is 0.8 miles from the venue, and the hotel where we have the room block is right across the street. So should you happen to decide to stay with us there, you will be literally right across the street from the venue. And it'll be in September, so the weather will be beautiful. And we are excited to support western North Carolina and the recovery efforts since the flood from last year. And so it's going to be great. We have an amazing speaker lineup and it's just going to be really fabulous. The theme this year is Where Wellness and Work Meet. So it's, you know. Yeah, we're excited to really have a focus on how to grow your business and maintain your sanity and health at the same them.
- [38:51]
Julia Campbell
Oh my gosh, I need all the help.
- [38:53]
Mandy Pierce
So we would love to have anybody that's welcome that's interested in joining us. And you can always reach out to me if you have questions.
- [38:59]
Julia Campbell
What's the website funding for good.com.org funding for good.org nonprofit consulting conference.org put all of this in the show notes and hopefully anyone listening is interested. I'm going to do my best to make it. I can't ever promise because I have like so much going on and just stuff and like, who knows where I'll be in September. Life could throw me another curveball. But I really want. It's on my calendar. Like I want to. I really, really want to go. So I'll make a decision before the early bird ends, but I would love some of my listeners to go and network. And it is such a lonely, it can be such a lonely business and it can be such kind of, you know, sometimes demoralizing. And especially with all of the changes going on right now, nonprofits being defunded and hiring freezes and consultants kind of get on the chopping block, especially marketing consultants like me. But just being able to talk with other people and just hearing your, your passion, Mandy, really. And I got so many ideas like this little ideas and kernels. Just sometimes talking with another consultant is so exhilarating and inspiring and helpful. So I really appreciate you sharing your time, your expertise. I know my listeners are going to get a lot out of this conversation.
- [40:14]
Mandy Pierce
Hey, thank you so much for having me. Let me know if there's anything I can do to be supportive of you guys.
- [40:24]
Julia Campbell
Well, hey there. I wanted to say thank you for tuning into my show and for listening all the way to the end. If you really enjoyed today's conversation, make sure to subscribe to the show in your favorite podcast app and you'll get new episodes downloaded as soon as they come out. I would love if you left me a rating or a review because this tells other people that my podcast is worth listening to, and then me and my guests can reach even more earbuds and create even more impact. So that's pretty much it. I'll be back soon with a brand new episode, but until then you can find me on Instagram @JuliaCampbell77. Keep changing the world, you nonprofit unicorn.