Transcription

00:00:04
            

Hey, everyone. Welcome back to another episode of the Holy Donuts podcast. I'm your host Matt Lombardi, joined today with Seth Hinz. Seth is the director of brand and marketing for Lutheran Bible translators based in St. Louis.        

00:00:16
            

You are at least, Seth, where's Lutheran Bible translators? Like, where's home base for them? Is it St. Louis as well? So it's about 3 hours west of St.        

00:00:23
            

Louis, smack dab in the center of Missouri. Concordia, Missouri. Yes, Concordia, Missouri. Okay. Gotcha, gotcha.        

00:00:30
            

Well, thanks for joining me today, man. Really, really excited to hop in and hear a little bit more about your story and some of your experience working with ministries. Absolutely. Yeah. So I am born and raised Lutheran, came up through lutheran church, Missouri.        

00:00:43
            

Stated, my dad's a pastor, grandpa's pastor, uncles are pastors. And so I was just in it from, from the very beginning. Came up through the grade schools, the high schools, and eventually one of the universities. Um, and I've just been living and breathing it ever since. Um, pretty early on knew that I wasn't going to be one of those pastors.        

00:01:02
            

Um, but, um, you know, I recently had to think back of, like, what was one of those pivotal moments in your life? And I can only ever, like, recall, like, vivid memories of my dad being in the pulpit and just like, making eye contact with every person in the church. And I was just like, my, my dad is passionate about this and he loves people. And, you know, seeing, we've, we've sat at gas stations for an hour just because he struck up conversations with people inside. And I was like, oh, my gosh, like, seeing him, like, be up in the pulpit and then walk the talk, like, out in the community was just like, okay, something here is meaningful.        

00:01:41
            

He loves sharing Jesus, and whatever I can do to help the church, to help ministries, I'm going to do that. And so that really shaped a lot of my, my life and my career. That's awesome, man. And so how long have you been with Lutheran Bible translators? I just started last February, so a little under a year now.        

00:01:58
            

So before that you were doing some marketing stuff, right, from the LinkedIn Internet sleuthing? I did, yes. Yeah, my full cv over there. Yeah, so I was, I started as a web media director, came up doing some copy stuff for one of our lutheran universities. Ended up working for a district for lutheran church, which is like a diocese regional thing up in Michigan.        

00:02:24
            

And it was, I did eight and a half years there. And so it was during that time where we were helping about 300 plus churches up there that I realized we are totally equipped to care for people. We are under equipped to reach people and connect with people in the digital space. And it was about in that time period where I realized I really need to lean in here and I need to help churches. I need to work one on one with them.        

00:02:53
            

And the more I'm at the district, I'm existing more and more in theory. And so I really needed to get to the ground, the ground floor, the front lines. And so during that time, my wife Rachel and I, we were praying about, okay, what's next? What are we supposed to do? And I ended up, we took a call to a church down in St.        

00:03:11
            

Louis, and that's what brought us here. And so for four and a half years, I was working with one of the larger churches in the lutheran church, taking them through a name change, but then also marketing strategies and trying to reach out to the community in new ways. And so that's really what got me started down this road that eventually led me to LBT. But, yeah, I would say it was during that transition time that I also started looking for something that was more repeatable, something that made more sense to me when it came to marketing communication, and that led me to storybrand, which I know some folks have talked about on the podcast before. And so when I found that, I eventually had to keep going, and in 2019, I became a guide and then was a guide up until last year.        

00:03:59
            

And so now I'm just living and breathing it for Lutheran Bible translators. That's so cool, man. Yeah. And there's, there is that, I think, instinct for a lot of folks who are in church comps, which is awesome. But if you're anything like I was when I was doing church comm stuff, it feels like everything you create is a one off project.        

00:04:16
            

It's like, okay, cool, we created this one time and now we put that on the shelf and I'll never use that again. Right, right. Whereas when you're working with a ministry that touches a lot of other ministries, you can create something one time and, oh, well, now this becomes a repeatable rhythm. Or if you're doing, you know, working on marketing for, like, donor communications or outreach or campaigns, like when you create something, you know, okay, now I've created something that we can, this is an engine, right, like that we can keep running back over and over again as opposed to, all right, we did all that work for six weeks and now onto the next thing. And so totally, totally understand that.        

00:04:49
            

Yeah, yeah, are there. You spoke a little bit more about being able to do some of the strategy stuff, are there some strategies or whether it's specific campaigns or principles that you've taken a Lutheran Bible translators that have really helped you guys kind of take you to the next level? Yeah, I think story is the whole thing. One of the I know we're gonna talk about trends and stuff like that coming up, but lots of ministries and nonprofits I know are aware of story and the approach of story brand. A lot of them don't know how to necessarily translate that to the nonprofit space.        

00:05:25
            

And so we have at Lutheran Bible translators, 136 programs going on right now around the world. We've got 55 specifically that are actionable, that are actually happening right now. I'm going to have to say that differently. Yeah, that's fine. So we've got 136 programs going on around the world right now.        

00:05:51
            

And what's a change from maybe when we first started is we started as a missionary organization, sending, we were sending people from America over internationally to start programs, keep programs going, get the translations going and all that. What's been happening over the past ten years and plus is this transition to the local team, the local team taking ownership and driving the project forward, and Lutheran Bible translator stepping back to a consultant role. And so what's important about that when it comes to story, and really for any ministry, is we have to make sure that we're telling the story in a way that the main character of the story is not us, it's not what we're doing, it's the people that we're serving and what they want. And so if you're familiar with storybrand, you really have to spend a lot of time thinking about who your beneficiaries are and what it is that they want out of life, what it is that they're trying to accomplish, that you can support through your ministry or nonprofit. And what you need to spend time on is not framing it in a things aren't going to happen if we don't do anything.        

00:07:07
            

You really have to spend on time and say, are we affirming dignity? Are we spending time and saying, these people have full lives, they're fully capable of all these things, but we can help accelerate that and we can help come alongside and keep shape for it. Because of our experience, we've been doing this translation thing for 60 years now, so we can provide some insight. But the most ownership and the way it's going to drive and be successful is if the local team owns it. And so we you, whichever ministry you're in, whether you're in ours, or not, you have to spend time talking about their story and about what God's word is going to mean for them in their lives.        

00:07:46
            

And even having a step before that. A lot of these languages don't. They don't have a written language. They're existing in oral languages. And so a lot of them don't think they can even have a written language because how does that even work?        

00:08:01
            

And so being able to walk alongside them and start to work through that process and show them that actually your language can be preserved and put in the written form, just they see a brand new sense of empowerment. And again, that dignity of just saying, like, we matter enough to somebody across the world that they would come in and walk alongside with us in order to preserve our heritage, our traditions, who we are, and really honor the language. And so if anything, I would just say, when you're telling stories, are you affirming people's dignity that you're serving and telling their story well? And so that's what we spend a lot of time on. Yeah.        

00:08:42
            

And this is interesting to me because it's like you have your beneficiaries, but then how do you help in some ways tell the story and educate your donors? Right. The benefactors, I guess it might be on why that sort of dignity based approaches the right way to do it. Right. Like why.        

00:09:00
            

Why we do ministry in this way, why we don't just say, yeah, we'll come and do all the work for you. Can you speak a little bit more to how you educate the donors on that? Yeah, that's a really good question. So what we do is we tell their story and we, there's a certain part of the story where the donor actually comes in. We try to tell a story of they are fully capable, they can do this thing, here's why they want it.        

00:09:27
            

Here's the problems that they're facing that's keeping them from getting it. Here's where they're looking for a consultant to come in, and this is where we have experience, and here's what the process is going to look like. And once you get through that part of the story, that's when we say we can turn to the donor and say, you have an opportunity to, one, pray for these people. Two, now that you see their story, if you're, if you donate to that, if you donate to this particular project, this is the specific problem that you're going to be helping to address, and you're going to be helping them not just with an influx of money, but you're going to be helping them buy the materials that they need. They're going to help buy the computers, the printers, all the different things so that, yes, they can do it, but you're going to help accelerate that.        

00:10:18
            

Back to and out of that, they're going to have God's word. They're going to have a written language. They're going to have the power of being able to hold God's word in their own language and not have to lean on anybody else. And being able to have that access is going to give people just the sense of hope of life, and it's really going to help transform people's lives. And so when people can see that I can help that story progress without stripping anybody of their dignity, that's how we make the connection.        

00:10:52
            

That's massive. I love that, man. Well, hey there, holy donuts. Listeners, ever feel like your nonprofit's donor experience is like a jelly filled donut with no jelly? Well, don't fret.        

00:11:03
            

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00:11:28
            

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00:12:00
            

so as you look out and you see, like, your framework for storytelling that you guys have used at Lutheran Bible translators, are there trends that you see in christian nonprofit land that are concerning to you and then maybe some that are exciting to you? Yeah. So the one that maybe I'm nervous about, because maybe some of you have sent these to me. I don't know. So I really struggle, and this is me personally, I really struggle with getting a mailer near the end of year that is full color, beautiful envelope, beautiful materials in the inside.        

00:12:37
            

But then it like, is very shock value verbiage and how you're freezing things. And it's like if this person doesn't get $12, they're going to face maybe even certain, you know, like, certain death. Right. I have a whole swipe folder of them, like, file cabinet here. Yeah.        

00:12:59
            

And I'm just like, every time I receive one of those, I hold it up and I'm like, why did you send this to me? That person is, like, on the verge of death, and, like, you're sending me this material. Don't spend $3 to send me this thing. Clearly, this is an emergency. And so when I see that kind of, like, shock value and everything's an emergency, it's just.        

00:13:20
            

It's red flags for me to say, like, you're not really telling me the real story, because if that was the real story, you wouldn't be spending $3 per envelope on this thing. And so I feel like that shock value starts to wear people down, and eventually it may work for a few campaigns, but eventually people are going to get exhausted on that. And so if we all continue to do that, kind of just like, emergency, emergency, emergency, eventually the donor base across the board is going to start to say, I don't know if I can handle it anymore, it's too much. So I think that. Yeah, I was gonna say it hooks you on the donor acquisition cycle, too, right?        

00:14:00
            

Because if you're constantly churning through them, you're not retaining those people. You know, one of the things, like, one of the kind of platitudes that we like to say for our clients and for us internally is, like, how you get them is how you keep them. And so if you get them with shock value, then you inevitably have to shock them more and more into ever. Actually continuing to give was just not a long term play for donor retention. And if everyone's doing that, you can just imagine what kind of a toxic cycle that pulls.        

00:14:27
            

So 100%, like, it's got to be something that's like, that shock. I'm right there with you. I collect those files for a reason, because I want to be able to say, hey, can we not do this? Yeah. Yeah.        

00:14:39
            

And so do I. So I have, like, a pile over on my desk right here. Yeah. It's like, gosh. And it's a reminder to me, like, it's not about the emergency.        

00:14:47
            

It's the dignity, and it's the process, and we can walk along people, and make an impact. So, on the flip side, one of the positive things I see was really born out of the GoFundme and Kickstarter and all that. What I see for the next generation, I think we all see that is they want specific impact. They want to know exactly where their dollars are going. And what that is forcing us to do as fundraisers is tell very specific stories about and break things down.        

00:15:22
            

Because when you say, well, you're giving to a fund that's $400,000, people are like, great. But like, what? Like, that's a. I'm just like, throwing a penny in there, basically. So what that forces us to do is break those things down so that I.        

00:15:38
            

And we've had to do this in a few of our campaigns, but break it down from 200,000 down to, like, that 2000 to 10,000 range. And then specifically say, when you give $2,000, it gives this. And then we can like, is this computer see this person holding this computer?        

00:15:57
            

And so people really want to see the direct impact of their dollars. If you make that percentage thing on GoFundMe Kickstarter go from 75% to 77%. They want to see it move. Yeah, yeah. And so they want to see that they're making the needle move, and they can't do that if all of our campaigns are a million dollars.        

00:16:16
            

And so we have to get. Break things down and get more specific, get more personalized. And so I love that it's forcing us to be more specific. Yeah, totally. Along with that, one of the, I mean, so one of the things that we see with that a lot is agreed with you 100%.        

00:16:31
            

There are challenges, obviously, in, like, the implementation of that. Right. Like, the more campaigns you have to do, the more of that, like, the more individualized you're trying to make the donor process, the more complexity. Right. Cause I.        

00:16:43
            

If you throw everyone into a big bucket, it's easier on your marketing team. Just one email sequence. It's one direct mailer if you want to do it specific. Now, all of a sudden, we have maybe 30 different micro campaigns running, and sometimes our infrastructure isn't designed for that. So, any thoughts on how you build an infrastructure that would allow you to actually do more personalized campaigns for donors?        

00:17:07
            

Yeah, what we've done is that we, like, end of year, we have, everybody has laps. Donors, we decided to not do everybody, but to start working in different ways. So we broke down a group of thousands of people down to, okay, we're gonna try to reach these 2000 people. And so when we were able to start segmenting and down to that, we were very specific on our criteria. Within three years, they live maybe in this area.        

00:17:40
            

And we just said, okay, we're going to make it very specific. For this group, we're not going to be, we don't have the capacity to do that for everybody. But what we're going to do is we're going to try to reactivate some people who cared about this ministry at one point and may have just fallen off the radar. And so we spent time just building out, we have our large campaigns, but we built out one campaign. And so instead of shifting to fifth gear, we said, we're going to start, we're going to shift into first gear.        

00:18:09
            

And so for this lapse campaign, we got very specific on the technology that we were helping to fund. We have this one fund that equips new missionaries and translation teams with computers and pays for printers. And we had used all of our granting for 2023. We need to rebuild it for 2024. When you give this, it leads to this.        

00:18:33
            

And so we were able to be very specific. We made it specific from RN, too. So it wasn't from Lutheran Bible translators, it was from our director of development. She has a face. We tied.        

00:18:46
            

She was the one that ended up sending all the emails from her. So we accompanied that. We had a video shot with her specifically making the plea out to those people. And so not only are you connecting with a specific cause where you can see where the dollars are going, but you have a real face to it, too, so you're not. We're trying to strip away all kind of the, it's just this large, unknown organization where a bunch of people work.        

00:19:13
            

We're trying to make it very specific. Yeah. And then at the same time we had a donor come along and say, we'll do a matching gift on that. And so when all those things combined, we were able to shift into first gear and say, if we were to do this, what is it going to look like? Yeah.        

00:19:29
            

And so I think what scares me a lot, and probably what scares some other folks is like, how do we get to this big point where everything's personalized? And I think the key for us really is just starting with one. If we did this, what would it look like? And so that's what we're doing. We're starting real slow and scale from there.        

00:19:49
            

I love it. I love it. Yeah. You just start recant, right? Yep.        

00:19:52
            

Hey, let's get started. Let's not use the, the bigness of it as an excuse to not take action. Just start with a place where we can start and we'll move from there and, I mean, we'll figure out the problems as they come up. Right. Like, that's all you can do is just keep taking a step forward.        

00:20:05
            

So what, are there any resources out there that you love to recommend to other people in kind of nonprofit land, in the marketing roles, donor engagement roles? Yes, absolutely. So, of course, story brand, that's what I've been talking about this whole way through. There's two other ones. So we're in a series or a season, I should say, of system building at our organization.        

00:20:29
            

And one of the system approaches that I love is duct tape marketing. They have a seven step small business approach, and it really easily translates over to what we're doing in the nonprofit world. And so I'll rattle those off real quick. Website number one website that builds trust, content platform blogging, podcasts, all that good stuff. SEO, search engine optimization, social media, reputation management, email marketing, and then your pay per click advertising, your digital marketing.        

00:21:04
            

And so if you're looking to say, like, what systems do I need to have in place? These are really the systems that you need to be working on. And reputation management has recently been impactful for us. And so that's going on to candid or guide star, however they want to be referred to right now and making sure that your profiles as up to date as possible. Having a recent video we had somebody go through who was recently looking for, I want to donate to Bible translation, but I don't necessarily know which one.        

00:21:36
            

So we had been, we had been working on repetition management, and they were able to make a decision based on some of the stuff that we had put up there. And so we had a donor who is not on our radar kind of take a step because we had our reputation management taking steps forward. So duct tape marketing, look at those seven systems. If you're unsure where to start, it's a place to start. That's awesome.        

00:21:58
            

Those are great resources. And so if folks want to connect with you, if they want to reach out, learn more about Lutheran Bible translators. What's the best way to do that? Are you active on social, email? What's the best way?        

00:22:08
            

Yeah, you can connect with me on LinkedIn, Seth. And then you could connect with me on Facebook. Yeah, all that kind of stuff. So I'm on all the platforms, but LinkedIn is probably the best way right now. Awesome, man.        

00:22:20
            

Seth, thank you so much for joining me today. I learned a ton. I know everyone listening as well, and really, really excited to see the ways that people are able to take what you talked about and implement this with their nonprofit. So thanks for joining me. Yeah, thanks.        

00:22:31
            

Thanks so much. Mandez.        

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