The P.O.S.T. Method – A Fast and Focused Framework to Develop a Nonprofit Digital Strategy

The POST Method:

The POST Method is a fast and focused approach for your organization to use so it can accomplish their overall digital marketing goals. In this day and age, many nonprofit teams struggle to find a way to not only set digital marketing goals, but also on how to strategize executing on these various goals. Creating a plan of action to accomplish organizational ambitions is often where teams hit a wall. Luckily, this is where the P.O.S.T Method can really drive effective action. Let’s dive in!

P: People

Depending on context, people are presented with different personas. When considering your audience, it’s likely that each individual that comprises your overall audience will be different in some aspect. So, it’s important to remember that each persona is not weighed equally either. In the first step of the P.O.S.T Method is where you have to breakdown the different groups of people you want to market to. Determine how you want your organization to target each group based off the various demographics, characteristics, or trends you find within the groups.

O: Objective

The next strategy within the P.O.S.T method is Objective. This is where you determine your organization’s purpose. What goals are you trying to accomplish? What is the objective of your nonprofit’s overall marketing strategy? How will this help your organization’s mission as a whole? While setting an objective can range from micro to macro goals, you still want to make sure that these objectives are quantifiable. It’s important to measure how successful you are in meeting each goal.

S: Strategy

The third part to the P.O.S.T Method is strategy. Once there is a better understanding as to who your organization’s audience is, and have set objectives or desired outcomes, it is time to move onto building out a strategy. Strategy is where your team will build the framework to use moving forward. This step will help make decisions about how you will execute on your marketing goals.  Decisions made within the Strategy section will include but are not limited to things such as determining your cost and budget and analyzing your available resources. Without a strategic framework to guide these important marketing decisions, your organization runs the risk of moving in too many different directions – causing you to accomplish very little. So, be mindful with this portion of the P.O.S.T Method, as it’s a vital one to nail down.

T: Tactic

Finally, tactic is the final part of the P.O.S.T Method. This is where your nonprofit decides which digital channels you will be using to execute the strategy you have come up within the previous step. Often times, there is a tendency to jump to this final pieces and try to post on social channels like LinkedIn, Facebook, or Instagram without considering audience or objectives. Understanding the environment of each social media is something that will help push your organization forward. Not each channel is followed by the same audiences, so make sure you are being mindful about your Tactic.  Once your team comes together with an effective objective and builds a strategy around it, executing on various digital platforms will be much easier and more efficient. So, don’t just jump to Tactic but really take your time in building out the other three components of the P.O.S.T Method.

Cameron Ripley