The Growth and Development of No-for-Profit Organisations in Australia Today - Essay Example

? Marketing Professional Marketing Professional Discuss the Growth and Development of no- for-Profit Organisations in AustraliaToday? Not-for-profit organisations (NFP) exist for reasons other than profit generation. These organisations can act as vehicles for alleviating societal problems whose solutions cannot be provided by the commercial enterprises. Their services and products are characterised by responsiveness, advocacy, flexibility, innovativeness, community building and expressiveness. The not-for-profit organisation employs over one million workers in Australia with the revenue expected to reach $105 billion by the end of 2012 (Shulman, 2012). The revenue base of the industry has increased at a constant rate of 3.5% and only decreased in 2008-2009 after the business donors cut-back. NFP organisations offer a wide array of services including operating hospitals, schools, and churches, as well as participating in community causes and fundraising events. The products offered a range from a sausage snack to Doctor of Philosophy degree. The prominent factor leading to the growth of NFP in Australia is the government support. This occurs in the form of direct funding, indirect funding e.g. concessions, and providence of a regulatory environment. The government offers financial services to these organisations as recognition for the value of their services in upholding the community welfare. Commercial enterprises have also contributed in the growth of NFPs through philanthropy support. Competition for government contracts and members services has enabled the NFPs to adopt efficient and superior strategies necessary for improvement of their competitive orientation. The NFPs associate with commercial entities on many occasions to improve social outcomes of some of their activities. The services offered by NFPs are superior to the ones offered by profit organisations in terms of the fields in which they operate and the basic character. They offer services of higher quality compared to commercial enterprises because they are non-profit oriented. NFP organisations competition with commercial enterprises in Australian is high. Amid this, they command wider acceptability among the society as people oppose the idea of commercialising community services. NFP organisations are inclined to serve people with the greatest need, thus, ensuring equity. Lack of extra charges for their services as required for profit generation makes their services cheaper than those of the commercial organisations. This attracts clientele as well as broadening the customer base leading to widening of service providence. Their focus on one community or group of people at a time cultivates loyalty and attracts preference among the service recipients. NFP organisations have rapidly expanded due to their characteristic property of potential flexibility and adaptability as they are not profit-oriented. This implies that they are capable of taking risks related to the creation of new business opportunities. NFP organisations have widely been accepted in Australia because of their advocacy role. They push for societal advancement as well as the change in government role as they are not market beholden. They are better placed to act as pioneers in various fields through identifying and solve the unaddressed societal problems (Salamon, Hems and Chinnock, 2000). NFP organisations serve as vehicles through which individuals and groups can express their opinions on various issues. This contributes into community building and democratisation through encouraging social interaction that creates the attitudes of trust and reciprocity. Organisational growth has also been realised by the ability of these organisations to overcome the constraints related to their daily operations. Regulatory constraints are minimised through transforming their legal structures and processes to conform in line with the Australian federal requirements. Their growth has also been sustained through formulation of strategies necessary for overcoming any constraints. Contracting constraints are overcome through improving the staff qualifications, quality standards and service delivery. They overcome funding and financial constraints are tackled through cultivating confidence among the financing institutions through transparency and accountability. You are the Marketing Director of a not-for-Profit Organisation Focused on Promoting Healthy Eating Habits to Young School Aged Children. How Would You Do This? Promotion of health among children will be undertaken through educating the community on the dangers of unhealthy eating and applying various channels of communication to deliver the message. According to Dolnicar and Lazarevinsky (2009), the most prominent marketing strategies are promotional in nature. I shall implement the promotional strategies on an organisation-centered mindset and-customer oriented approach (Andreasen and Kotler, 2003). This will improve the competitive advantage relative to other organisations promoting healthy eating among children. The outcome, in terms of organisation’s mission, will also be increased. Some of the promotional strategies to be implemented include the creation of a dynamic website with a capability of appeal to the children as well as parents. The website will be used as a center of communication between the organisation and the customers. This implies that all employees must possess efficient computer skills for proper delivery of health information through the internet. Visitors will be given an immediate, positive impression through ensuring that the website is equipped with tweets, blogs, and photography and event information on the current issues affecting eating habits, as well as the organisation’s cause and mission. The website will be equipped with content management system that syndicates all the updated information on the appropriate pages for easy access. Outreach will also be ensured through using the social media such as face book or tweeter to share information regarding the activities of the organisation and healthy eating habits. This strategy will ensure direct access to the youths, who are the prominent users of the social media. Sharing the organisations activities through social media will increase the probability of reaching out to new members. Measures will be put enacted to allow brand enthusiasts become creators as each member will be will geared towards the success of the organisation. They will assist in creating blogs, websites and even videos that expounds on the organisation’s brand and activities. The internet will also be used to promote the organisation’s financial pool through the creation of a tab on the social website such as “Donate now” (Lopez, Mendana and Gonzalez, 2005). This will encourage the users contribute to the cause after understanding the activities of the organisation. The organisation will ensure volunteer recruitment through building a powerful platform in the social media and online advertisement to allow mass access. Demonstrations and real life interviews from the nutritional experts will be aired in the press. Nutritional experts from within and without the organisation will be involved in promotion of healthy eating. Their views will be posted over the internet, press or published. The materials will be distributed widely especially in schools at an affordable cost. Direct promotion will be ensured through sending experts to the field such as schools where lectures on the healthy eating and organisation’s activities will be given to the teaching staff as well as the students. Promotional strategies will include the involvement of political leaders and celebrities. They will be encouraged to cross-promote the organisation’s activities in their publicity campaigns. I shall take advantage of the celebrities’ eagerness to gain more popularity among the community and engage them in promoting the organisation’s activities. The organisation will be involved in retaliatory practices such as offering certificates of cooperation to various parties. This is geared towards giving credit back to those who support the organisation’s activities thus maintaining loyalty among the existing donors and partners as well as attract new ones. Communication on the appropriate strategies for serving the donor or stakeholder interest will be enhanced to maintain their confidence on the organisation’s services. Would ever use Spam as an Email Strategy to Promote a Fundraising Effort for the Perth Zoo. Why or Why Not? I would not use spam to promote the fundraising effort for the Perth Zoo. This is because although spam messages are easy to create and cheap to use, they have progressively become inefficient due to the opposition attached to its use. Use of the spam will not attain the required impact as most people do not approve the use of spam in internet transactions. Most of the internet users have configured their internet accounts to block spam messages. This implies that most target donors would not receive the message because the service is already disabled from their account. According to Raz (n.d.), large proportion of spam messages contains materials that are confirming their contents as they are considered fraudulent or offensive. Many people delete most of these messages without accessing them as they are perceived to be unworthy. Sorting through spam messages is time consuming as the messages are normally many. This discourages most recipients from accessing them. Legislations have also been adopted to ban the use of spam implying that the message will never be delivered to target individuals inhabiting such nations e.g. the United States. Additionally, the use of this service may turn the fundraising motive into a court battle. For instance, in the US legislative proposals have been enacted to illegalise the use of service, with the internet service providers given the freedom to sue any violators of this directive (Spirin and Han, 2012). This means that one may take the pains of conforming to the rules regulating the e-mail use and still ending up failing to relay the message to the target group. Spammers are normally common with the small internet service providers who have limited coverage. Use of small internet providers might impair access to the targeted audience. Promotion strategy of a financial nature will involve the services of a large internet service provider to ensure wider coverage and access. Sending spam messages may be viewed by the receivers as an ill-intention of destroying their electronic devices as they require the installation of filters that consumes the computer cycles and memory. Sending messages randomly, as is the case with spam messages, may curtail effectiveness as the crucial parties may left out due to confusion. The messages are too general that they can be sent to anyone possessing an e-mail account. The unpopularity of the spam messages may encourage the e-mail contents to lack the required information on the cause. This is because the composer might not apply the required accuracy when drafting as they are not sure if they will be conveyed. It is only logical for one to use the required communication channels that relay the message to the target audience. Messages such as financial messages are crucial thus; any messages should have a surety that they will be relayed to the targeted audience. References Andreasen, A. R., & Kotler, P. (2003). Strategic marketing for non-profit organisations (6th Ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall. Dolnicar, S., & Lazarevinsky, K. (2009). Marketing in non-profit organisations: An international Perspective, International Marketing review, 26(3), 275-279. Lopez, E., Mendana, C., & Gonzalez, B. (2005). Webquests: An educational support tool in Public and non-profit marketing. International Review on Public and Non-profit Marketing, 2(2), 98-112. Raz, U. (n.d). Advertising on the Internet, or why is Spam Bad? Retrieved from http://www.private.org.il/anti-spam.html Salamon, L. M., Hems, L. C., & Chinnock, K. (2000). The non-profit sector: For what and for whom? Working papers of the Johns Hopkins comparative non-profit sector project, No.37. Baltimore: The John Hopkins center for civil society studies. Shulman, C. (2012). Charities and not-for-profit organisations in Australia. IBISWorld Industry report x0021. Retrieved from http://www.ethicaljobs.com.au/files/2012_NFP_report.pdf Spirin, N., & Han, J. (2012). Survey on web spam detection: principles and algorithms. ACM SigKDD Explorations Newsletter, 13(2), 50-64. Read More