Tag: #Wordifier

October Word(s) of the Month: Goals vs. Objectives

Posted on: by Erica Barnhart

Goals. Objectives. What’s the difference? And do you need to care?

If you care about your nonprofit being successful then, yes, you need to care. You know that setting appropriate goals and objectives are key to the success of your nonprofit’s initiatives, and your nonprofit as a whole. Because you can’t save the world without a plan!

And according to the Claxon Method, if you’re not clear on your goal, you can’t identify your target audience, and then your messaging risks running amuck. And, although amuck is fun to say, it’s not strategic to do.

That’s why this month, we’re diving deeper in the meanings of goal and objective. We wanted to know: Can we glean anything useful by looking at the history and evolution of these two seemingly similar words?

Let’s start by looking at how we use these today, especially in the business world:

Goal: An overarching aspiration that guides your decisions.

Objective: The smaller, measurable steps that get you to your goal.

For example, the goal of your nonprofit organization may be to end homeless in your city. An objective may be to increase the amount of affordable housing in your city by 50% within 5 years.

Makes sense.

While these words both evolved at different times and in different ways, the definition is basically the same: A destination. Maybe that’s why people use them almost interchangeably.

But it’s worth understanding where these two words came from and, therefore, how they are distinct from one another.

It turns out goal has a longer history than its cousin objective. According to Etymology Online, it first appeared in a poem in the early 14th century as gol, indicating a boundary or limit. The interesting thing? That poem was the word’s only known appearance until a few decades later, when it started to show up as “the endpoint of a race”.

So goal has its roots in sports. Obviously, there’s still a lot of goal-talk today in sports. But when did it evolve to also mean a purpose, or something to strive for, outside of a sport?

Most likely, somewhere around 1960 when the word’s frequency in written communications began to increase drastically:

 

Why the increase? Dunno exactly. But there’s no denying it became in vogue to have/use/write about/talk about having goals. Cuz, #LifeGoals.

In comparison to goal, objective hasn’t been around as long. It appeared as an adjective in 1610 as the counter to subjective, meaning simply “in relation to its object”. Only much later, in 1855, did it start to indicate “unbiased and quantifiable”. (If you’ve ever put together a research study or survey, you’ll know this usage well.)

The usage we’re interested in for this post, meaning “aim or goal” came about much later. In 1881 to be exact. Objective point is a military term used to describe a place upon which to focus a troop’s attention. The stand-alone objective (minus the point) evolved from this usage.

So, whereas goal sprouted from a general boundary or endpoint in a race, objective is rooted in military strategy. Could this be why objectives are smaller and more measurable than goals? In military strategy, your overall goal may be to win a war, and its the objective points of individual troops that will get you there.

I can’t say for sure if this is the case. But I can say that being mindful of the difference between goals and objectives, and having both for your organization make you and your nonprofit more successful. And your messaging more remarkable!

Side note: According to The Wordifer, goal is one of those words that nonprofits use too darn much in their external communications. Yet, its cousin objective isn’t nearly as prevalent. If you think about it, this makes sense. When we’re communicating our nonprofit’s purpose to the world via our website, we’ll often speak of our end goals, and not the objectives that carry us there. However, if your goal is to inspire trust in your supporters — and it should be — you might way to share your objectives as well.

September Word of the Month: Reflections on Reflect

Posted on: by Erica Barnhart

Many of us in the nonprofit-sphere, including us here at Claxon, tend to enjoy setting aside time for reflection at the end of the year or the start of the new year.

And for good reason. Year end brings a concrete time to close out those financials, wrap up successes (and perhaps failures, too) in a pretty annual report, and figure out what you’ll do differently in the fresh start of the coming year.

We’ve been thinking about — or should I say reflecting on — the concept of reflection here at Claxon recently. And being the word nerds that we are, we decided to delve into the word itself to find out what we can learn and how we can tie it back to our professional and personal lives.

In this post, we’ll share what we’ve learned: how the definition of reflect has changed over time, how nonprofits are currently using it, and how YOU can use it now to set yourself up for a more impactful future.

The Origin of Reflect

The original definition of reflect, one that’s been around since the 14th century and that we still use today, is the bending of light back toward its source. In fact, the root word -flect simply means “bend”. (Catholics will recognize this from genuflect, which is a fancy way to say bending your knee in respect.)

This meaning of reflect can take many forms: the moon reflecting the sun’s light to Earth, the sky reflecting its color off the ocean, some random light reflecting off of my watch and onto the wall driving my cat crazy, etc.

Reflect is what happens when you look in a mirror. And it’s perhaps this use that caused reflect to move from a mere reflection of light to a reflection in the mind, in the second half of the 17th century.

Reflection definition #2: serious thought or consideration.

Today’s Usage & Nonprofit Usage

In recent times, we are putting even more emphasis on reflection, and my guess is that this is not the light reflection definition. The following graph, supplied by Google, shows the usage of the word “reflect” as a percentage in books from 1800 – 2008.

What caused the sharp bump in the latter half of the 20th century? Could we, as culture, be putting increased focus on reflection of the mind? Perhaps self-reflection in particular?

While I don’t know the answer to that question, I am able to see how nonprofits are using the word “reflect”, specifically on their websites. According to the Wordifier, nonprofits tend to use the word somewhat frequently. It earns a yellow light in the Wordifier’s scale:

While usage of reflect is pretty evenly distributed across the nonprofit sector, religious organizations tend to use it a bit more:

Are religious organizations reflecting more than other nonprofits? Or, are they encouraging their supporters to reflect on their own lives and beliefs? Either way, all nonprofits and their staff members have an opportunity to follow suit and challenge themselves to be more aware – reflecting on their endeavors throughout the year and not just at year end or during infrequent strategic planning sessions.

Resources for Reflection

Many resources exist to help you build the practice of reflection into your life and your work. You can also find specific ways to incorporate reflection into your nonprofit’s routine.

Here at Claxon, we’re all about remarkable messaging. We know that the words we use to talk about our nonprofits make a big difference in the results we see.

That’s why we have a few free tools for you to reflect on your language choices to raise more money and do more good.

Messaging Quiz: Is your messaging helping or hurting your nonprofit’s mission? Take this five-minute quiz and find out.

Organizational Lexicon: This nifty tool will help your nonprofit create your very own lexicon. By doing this you up the odds that you’ll use words that make you consistently stand out from the crowd.

Personal Lexicon: In this day and age, personal brand is important. The words you use are part of that brand. With this in mind, we adapted the Organizational Lexicon, so you could create a lexicon all your own!

What reflection practices do you have for your life, your work, and your communications strategy? Tweet to us @ClaxonMarketing and let us know!

August’s Word of the Month: HELP

Posted on: by Erica Barnhart

Help is such a core part of our non-profit identity. So, how can we can possibly stop overusing this word? Read on to find out in our latest installment of Word of the Month.

“Help!” It’s what the non-profit sector is all about, right? We help the environment, we help children, we help the homeless. We ask folks to help us carry out our mission with support, donations, and volunteer hours.

With all this helping going on, I’m sure you’re not surprised to learn that according to our research, “help” is high on the charts of the most commonly-used word by non-profits. (Others include need, more, support, and please. Notice a trend?)

We also know that overused words don’t do anything for our mission. By using the same words that every other non-profit uses, our mission statements and other communications get lost in the abyss of overlooked messages.

This is why The Wordifier gives us the red light on the word “help”.

Nonetheless, many organizations continue to use this word, and use it heavily. Here are a few examples of mission statements I discovered by googling some well-known non-profits:

To help people worldwide where the need is greatest, delivering emergency medical aid to people affected by conflict, epidemics, disasters, or exclusion from health care. – Doctors Without Borders

To alleviate suffering, poverty and oppression by helping people build secure, productive and just communities. – Mercy Corps

To help more moms have full-term pregnancies and healthy babies. – March of Dimes

With helping being such a core part of our non-profit identity, you may wonder how we can possibly stop overusing this word and make our mission statements and other messaging more remarkable. What’s a non-profit to do?

Well, let’s start by looking back to help’s origins.

Not surprisingly, the word help dates back pretty far, stemming from the Old English helpan. At that point in time, it was exclusively a transitive verb, meaning it was required to have a direct object tied to it. For example, you couldn’t just helpan in general, you had to helpan something.

In the 13th century, this changed, and the intransitive use emerged, meaning to “offer aid or assistance”. Help moved out of the realm of an action-packed verb, and into more general, conceptual realm.

And this is my advice to non-profits: Think of help not as an action word, but as a concept. When you frame it that way, you’ll see that there are other words that will get your helping point across in a stronger way.

Luckily, The Wordifier offers alternatives to any given word that are not overused, and therefore will make your mission and messaging shine! Pay special attention to the words in green, as those are the least commonly used by non-profits. 

You’ll also notice that these words can pinpoint an exact action in a way that the generic “help” cannot. “Ease” has a much different meaning than “boost” or “amend”, yet all three can be used in place of a “help” depending on the context.

Here are a few examples of non-profits successfully replacing help with a more descriptive, yet similar word.

To defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States. – ACLU

To connect people through lending to alleviate poverty. – Kiva

To create, find and support programs that directly improve the health and wellbeing of children. – Ronald McDonald House.

Take a stab at removing help from your own communications, and share your results with us @ClaxonMarketing. I hope this post enriched your view of non-profit word choice, and will upgrade your non-profit’s future messaging!

Want to upgrade your non-profit’s messaging even more? Check out our online training through Claxon University.

July Word of the Month: Remarkable

Posted on: by Erica Barnhart

This is the latest installment in our “Word of the Month” series to help non-profits make intentional language choices (while indulging our own word nerdery). Up this month? Remarkable.

A few months ago, we explained why we love the word remarkable so darn much. So much, in fact, that we’re happy to leave “awesome” in the dust for this striking and incredible word (that basically means striking and incredible! How about that?)

We’re guessing that you think your non-profit’s cause is pretty remarkable. Yet,1 you also likely continue to use the same stock of words, such as “awesome” and “great”. We looked to the Wordifier to show us how all of these words stack up:

The word remarkable stems from the French remarquer which means, “to take note of” or “worthy of notice”. Definitely something we all wish folks would do with our cause!

Okay, so now that we know why remarkable is so remarkable, what other words fall into this category?

Again, we turned to the Wordifier to advise us. (By the way, if you aren’t familiar with the Wordifier and why it’s a remarkable tool for choosing your non-profit’s words, check out this post). And since verbs are the superheroes of our sentences, let’s start there.

Here are a few remarkable verbs that the Wordifier gives us the green light on. I’ve bolded my personal favorites 🙂

Accelerate, activate, alleviate, anchor, broaden, collaborate, complement, confront, cultivate, deepen, defend, delight, elevate, eradicate, generate, ignite, illustrate, mobilize, motivate, nurture, rally, relieve, remedy, revitalize, shield, stabilize, steward, sustain, unite, uphold.

And here are some adjectives to spruce up your sentences:

Adept, apathetic, brilliant, colossal, deafening, diligent, disillusioned, endless, fierce, gentle, hopeful, hushed, illustrious, immense, lively, nimble, remarkable, rapid, resonant, somber, splendid, striking, swift, vigorous, zealous.

As you can probably tell from reading these words, they are not your standard, run-of-the-mills “awesomes” and “greats”. Each of these words paints a picture, gives a concrete feeling, and most importantly, are not overused by non-profits.

What are your favorite remarkable words? Tweet to us @ClaxonMarketing.

Words, Words, Words! Introducing Claxon’s “Word of the Month”

Posted on: by Erica Barnhart

At Claxon, we embrace our word nerdery proudly. That’s because, like you, we know the importance of choosing the right words. One word can mean the difference between getting noticed and getting overlooked.

We love words so much, we create tools and resources such as The Wordifier so nonprofits can make their messaging remarkable.

We also love diving deep into a particular word to find out its history, its evolution, and its level of remarkable-ness. And we love sharing what we’ve uncovered so that you can make informed word choices for your cause.

That’s why we’re launching a Word of the Month series!

Each month, we’ll choose a word that’s commonly found in nonprofit communications, or a word we feel is underutilized by nonprofits. We’ll explain where the word comes from, how often it’s used, and what to watch for when determining whether or not to use it in your communications.

To kick off this series, we’re starting with the one word I’ve used more than any other in this post thus far. We’re getting a little silly, as well as a little meta. Have a guess?

This month’s word is “word”.

Before beginning to research the word “word”, I made the assumption that its origins would date back pretty far. As soon as we started having elements of speech to describe objects, actions, and ideas, it would follow naturally that we have a way to describe these speech elements themselves, right?

Yep. Turns out, the word “word” has been in use since basically the dawn of the English language, when “Old English” was spoken. It’s from the Proto-Germanic “wurdan”. (Don’t worry, I didn’t know what Proto-Germanic was either.)

Here’s the coolest thing I found out: In its original Old English, it also had an additional implication: a promise. There’s something beautiful, if not a bit intimidating, about a word being a promise. (Maybe this is where the phrase “as good as your word” stems from?)

There are many variations on “word” that arose much more recently. “Wordsmith”, for example, popped up in 1896, and “buzzword” came around in 1946, thought to be originated from Harvard students’ slang for the most important words in their lectures or readings.

And unlike a lot of other words whose popularity ebbs and flows over time, “word” has stayed pretty consistent in its frequency of use. No surprise there!

Even though this month’s Word of the Month is more of a playful announcement than a word your nonprofit actually needs to be conscious of, we decided to run it through The Wordifer to see what would happen.

Turns out, a majority of uses of this word are from religious organizations. This totally makes sense. (Think: “The Word of God”).

Thanks for joining us in having a bit of fun with the word “word”! Check in next month when we explore a word that can either boost your nonprofit messaging’s remarkable-ness, or bring you down to the land of the overlooked.

Resource Roundup: 7 Tools to Boost Your Writing Skills in 2017

Posted on: by Erica Barnhart

Last week, I asked for new skills in the new year. This week, I figured I’d share what I already know with you, because #sharingiscaring. I’ve rounded up the best word-a-rific resources I’ve discovered — or rediscovered — in 2016. Enjoy!

  1. Your Essential Proofreading Checklist – Proofreading means so much more than catching typos. Especially when you go from writing in your own voice to the voice of your non-profit. You have to start thinking about things such as brand consistency, tone, and flow. So that we don’t feel too overwhelmed to even start, Hubspot put together this handy checklist.
  2. Readability Calculator – Sounding erudite is overrated. People want content that they can digest quickly, usually by skimming. Don’t believe me? Check out these stats. But that doesn’t mean hope is gone for your carefully-crafted content to be read and enjoyed. Use a readability scoring tool to make sure you can be understood on the quick — and by everyone.
  3. The Thesaurus – Yes, this may seem obvious. But trust me, it’s not. Too many times, I’ve heard the adage, if you need to use a thesaurus, then your word is too complicated — or something like that. And I couldn’t disagree more. Just because a word isn’t on the tip of our tongues doesn’t mean it’s a bad choice. We already know that unique words get more attention. Which brings me to the next resource….

  4. The Wordifier – It’s like a thesaurus, but better. Find out how frequently any word is used across nonprofit websites. Why? To figure out if you need to choose something a bit more dazzling. Also, you can easily find alternatives if your word does happen to be overused.

  5. 128 Words to Use Instead of Very – I came across this infographic earlier this year, and I kind of fell in love. Very is the writing equivalent of taking the easy way out. With so many simple yet descriptive words in our gorgeous language, never settle for very again.

  6. Kivi’s Weekly E-Newsletter – If you’re like me, you get too much email. And most of it feels like junk. So, when something engaging and useful comes through the noise, I feel grateful. Enter Kivi’s weekly e-newsletter. While each week is full of great tips and reflections on non-profit communications, my favorite part is the once-a-month, timely writing prompts that can cure even the most stubborn writer’s block.

  7. Claxon University – Claxon U is the place to go to get trained up on doing more good with your words. It’s an online course designed specifically for nonprofit professionals who want to up their communications game. Plus, there’s a special deal going on now through December 31, 2016, so I’d hurry on over if I were you.

What writing resources have you found helpful this year? Share the knowledge in the comments below, or tweet to us @ClaxonMarketing!

Do Happy Salmon Make for Good Messaging?

Posted on: by Erica Barnhart

Nooksack Salmon Enhancement Assoc LogoUntil the other day, I hadn’t thought much about happy salmon.

But that all changed when Adrian Shulock, who works for the Nooksack Salmon Enhancement Association, sent me a delightful email.

After reading my SSIR article on how to spruce up your mission statement, Adrian shared a bit about their mission and the statement that explains it. What I learned was so happy-making, I asked if I could share it publicly. Lucky for us, he said yes!

To be clear: The following is not meant to imply that NSEA should officially change its mission statement. I’m not recommending they edit their by-laws, etc. It is, instead, offered as an objective take at how effectively their mission statement engages those new to the organization. It is food (or chum…couldn’t resist) for thought.

Okay, let’s start by looking at NSEA’s current mission statement. This statement appears loud and proud on their homepage. Its starring role means its job is to make visitors go, “Ohhhh, that’s cool. Tell me more!” Inspiring them to voraciously click their way through the site to learn more.

NSEA is a community-based nonprofit organization dedicated to restoring sustainable wild salmon runs in Whatcom county.

In the plus column for this statement? They focus on ONE THING–restoring sustainable wild salmon runs in Whatcom County. No laundry list here. Huge kudos for that.

In the minus column: the Reading Ease Score on this statement is, alas, zero, meaning it’s almost impossible to understand what they’re saying. People rarely ask questions about things they totally can’t understand (too daunting, they feel dumb). So it’s a conversation-stopper, rather than a conversation-starter.

Also, according to the Wordifier, the statement is packed with words popular with other nonprofits, lowering the chances that it will pique people’s interest. Bummer.

Adrian noticed that the mission statement didn’t exactly blow people’s hair back. So, when people ask what NSEA does, Adrian now says:

NSEA fixes broken creeks so that salmon – and you – can live happy.

This response scores a whopping 81.8 for Reading Ease! This statement does have a few words popular with nonprofits in general. BUT the way in which Adrian combines them makes them interesting. What does a happy salmon look like? How do happy salmon make my life happier? How do you fix broken creeks? All intriguing questions that would propel the conversation forward. Which is exactly what we want.

Again, I’m not necessarily suggesting NSEA  officially change its mission statement. That’s a Big Deal that warrants Much Deep Thought & Analysis. I am, however, suggesting that they figure out how engaging their mission statement really is to supporters who would want to fix broken creeks so salmon–and people–can live happy.

For more tips on writing a mission statement that’s as great as your mission, check out this SSIR article. It’s a quick, practical read.

Need help making your communications as awesome as possible? We’re here for you.

Post Readability Stats: Reading Ease 59.7, Grade Level 7.8

 

Lesson 8: How will you let people know what you want to be known for?

Posted on: by Erica Barnhart

This is part of a series introducing you to Claxon University, where nonprofits can learn everything I know for $949.

Claxon University’s first course is Words on a Mission. Each of the twelve lessons in the course asks a fundamental question a nonprofit needs to answer in order to develop high-impact messaging. In each post in this series, I’ll share what the question is, along with a snippet from the video lecture.

Lesson 8: How will you let people know what you want to be known for?

Lesson 8: Does your Mission Statement align with your Know Statement? from Claxon University on Vimeo.

Is surprising supporters good or bad?

Posted on: by Erica Barnhart
nonprofits, messaging, language, words, messaging
Yawning’s cute when it’s a baby doing it. Not when it’s a supporter.

There’s a really interesting blog post called, “How to Improve Your Writing: 5 Tips from Hollywood” by Eric, “the guy behind the Barking Up the Wrong Tree blog“.

Tip #2 was: Surprise your readers.

Why surprise? Because we remember things that surprise us.

This got me wondering: Do nonprofits surprise their supporters enough? 

If we’re looking at the words nonprofits use, the answer would be absolutely, positively not! Our research shows that nonprofits are doing a downright miserable job of surprising their supporters and a very good job of boring them.

Nonprofits are only using 5% of the words in the English language. And 1% of the words nonprofits use account for 65% of all the words they use.

No surprise–it’s a linguistic yawnfest.

It begs the question: how do you effectively surprise supporters?

Back to Eric and the blog post:

Surprise comes from knowing the expectations of your audience — and then turning them on their head.

In order to do this effectively, you first have to know your supporters inside and out. That means creating personas. (If personas are new to you, read this, this and this.)

Once you know the types of words that will resonate with a given persona, brainstorm words that are similar but have a bit more oomph.

There’s a fine line between startling and surprising. Surprising is good. It wakes up the brain. It’s engaging. Startling can be off-putting. So don’t go overboard.

Some ideas for generating words that surprise:

Bored supporters are rarely happy supporters. Happy supporters are usually stupendous supporters. So, for their sake and yours, mix up your language. Surprise them. (Whatever you do, don’t ever send them a boring thank you letter.)

Do you know many nonprofits in your state have a website?

Posted on: by Erica Barnhart

In a post earlier this week, I shared a startling new finding from our Wordifier research: more than 50% of nonprofits don’t have a website.*

A state by state breakdown shows us how much this varies depending on geography. In Maine, for instance, 65% of nonprofits have a website. Whereas in New Mexico and Wyoming, a scant 29% do.

This map breaks it down state by state.

research, nonprofits, websites

 

The five states with the highest percentage of nonprofits with websites?

1. Maine: 65%

2. DC: 64%

3. Washington: 61%

4. Idaho & Puerto Rico: 60%

5. Vermont: 59%

And the five states with the lowest percentage of nonprofits with websites?

46. Alabama: 37%

47. Rhode Island: 36%

48. Arkansas: 33%

49 & 50. Wyoming & New Mexico: 29%

Makes you wonder: how easy/hard are nonprofits in your state making it for supporters to find them on-line? 

***If you want your nonprofit to stand out from the crowd–whether on-line, in-person, or in print–check out Claxon University.***

 

*Reminder about what we mean by “no website”: We mean when pulling our sample, we didn’t find an independent url for ~50+% of the nonprofits for which we were searching. Some might have had an online presence, e.g. Facebook pages or a webpage on a connected, but separate organization. For instance, it’s very common for Friends of the Library and PTAs/PTSAs to have a web presence as a page on the related organization’s site, but often not their very own site. Other organizations, businesses, social clubs, or even other nonprofits with a foundation or scholarship might have mentioned the 501c3 arm, or maybe just mention that they have a scholarship, but it is the parent organization that has the website, so that didn’t count.

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