Tell Me Who You Are, in 10 Words or Less

A few years back, the nonprofit where I worked, spurred by a savvy marketing communications guy who was trying to drag the organization kicking and screaming into the 21st century, engaged in the painful of process of developing a tagline. More than a few members of the internal community thought the initiative a shallow, unseemly ploy, as if the essence of who and what we were could not possibly be condensed into a few words. Yet in this age of increasing mental clutter and external distractions, distilling one’s mission into a bite-sized phrase makes terrific sense, whether an organization is in the nonprofit or corporate sector.

Nonprofit marketer Nancy Schwartz, author of the Getting Attention Blog, certainly agrees. She has launched a nonprofit tagline initiative and is asking her readersto complete a short survey about taglines; in exchange, she’ll send along a free copy of the report that falls out of that survey. It’s for a good cause — as my colleague realized (and was able to convince our senior leadership of), pithy doesn’t have to mean shallow | 501(c)