Tom’s 127 Facts About Video Marketing last week inspired me to reprise some of my favorite videos that we’ve used in Agitator posts.

So, for your  viewing (and reading) pleasure here are three re-runs worth your time because I think each makes a helpful point.  Each of the posts below contains text which the video illustrates.   Or, if you prefer to skip the text you can just click on the video.

ON RFPs…

Summer Dream Becomes Fall Nightmare as RFP Surfaces: Somewhere out there on a beach, in a forest or on some mountain trail there’s a CFO, CEO or new VP for Development making mental notes on the agenda for the fall Board Meeting.

And you can bet one of her/his suggestions will be to put out a Request for Proposal (RFP) in hopes of improving income, or paying homage to some capricious notion that “we ought to bid out this consulting work more often”. Heaven only knows what thoughts lurk in the minds of vacationing nonprofit execs — and what nightmares their dreams might produce.

ON FIXING PROBLEMS…

What Are You? Are you really a Fundraiser? Or are you just a Fundraising Monitor?

Here at The Agitator we sure do a lot of monitoring. Tom and I think we should also be doing more along the lines of  encouraging, debating and reporting on ‘fixing’.

It’s clear from the lively discussion occurring among our readers that there’s growing awareness that it’s simply too risky to stick with the status quo.

Why monitor a project if you don’t fix it?

ON THE COURAGE TO TAKE RISKS…    [Viewer discretion advised]

Would You Approve This Campaign?

PROBLEM: Overall there are currently 120,000 men, women and children waiting for an organ donation, and roughly 8,000 of those people, about 22 per day, die each year because they won’t receive the organs they need in time.

Donate Life America, a nonprofit charged with developing and promoting organ donor education programs designed to motivate Americans to register as organ, eye and tissue donors, has seen a drop-off in the number of millennial donors. By signing up, one millennial could save as many as 50 lives.

SOLUTION: Turn to The Martin Agency, noted for, among other great work their edgy campaigns for GEICO, the insurance company. And, of course the GEICO gecko.

With music by Coldplay, acting by Thomas Jane and voice over by Will Arnett, directors Will Speck and Josh Gordon have produced a campaign titled “The World’s Biggest Asshole”.

 Would you have approved this campaign?

I can just imagine the countless meetings, worries about angry contributors, fears of adverse press response, an angry board, you name it.

This project took lots and lots of work and lots and lots of courage. Courage all too rare in our world.

What would you have done?

Whatever your answer, here’s wishing you a good rest of the week.

Roger