Interested in Working with Me Directly?

I no longer practice what many people consider traditional consulting: doing all the work for our clients. Instead, my consulting practice is always some combination of training, coaching, and advising.

With my support, you and your team are actually doing the creation and implementation of workflows, strategies, plans, etc. – not me. Why? This approach produces much more understanding, ownership, and internal capacity because you and your staff created it.

I’m there to keep the process on track to completion, to provide context and best practices, to ask thought-provoking questions, and to ensure that by the end of our consulting relationship you are poised for significant and meaningful changes. This approach ultimately produces more effective marketing and fundraising communications.

See below for more details on exactly what I mean by training, coaching, and advising.

Hi! I’m Kivi Leroux Miller, the founder & CEO of Nonprofit Marketing Guide. If you are interested in hiring me to work with your nonprofit, please review this page first, then send an email to set up a time to chat.

The Kinds of Work We Can Do Together

  • Reevaluating communications strategies after a significant organizational change

  • Developing robust permission-based marketing and content marketing strategies (see my book, Content Marketing for Nonprofits, for what I mean)

  • Harmonizing working relationships between communications and fundraising teams

  • Adopting more effective communications practices, processes, and workflows  (See my book, CALM not BUSY, for what I mean)

  • Reassessing the why, where, and how of the communications team’s work within a growing nonprofit, including the model used (e.g. centralized, integrated, internal agency, etc.).

  • Prioritizing objectives and deciding what to measure

  • Looking at what it will take to get you as a team leader or your team as a whole to the “next level” and what that next level looks like

  • “Train the trainers” programs where I help a small group of colleagues get up to speed on how to do a particular aspect of nonprofit marketing so that they can then train a larger cadre of people (e.g., within an association, coalition, or network).

What We Mean by Training, Coaching, and Advising

  • Training

  • Coaching

  • Advising

  • Training
  • Coaching
  • Advising
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  • Training

    I'll share what we know about what works best, based on years of research and experience. All consulting clients receive a comped All-Access Pass to our webinars and online workshops.

  • Coaching

    Coaching is about asking you the right questions to help you reach the best decisions for your organization. I know the questions and what order to ask them in so that with your answers, you get where you want to be without getting overwhelmed.

  • Advising

    This is the bulk of a typical consulting relationship, but not in my case. Advising is telling you what I think you should do. When I’m advising, it's usually to provide you with the confidence that you are making the right choice or to serve as a tie-breaker when you really can't decide.

The Process of Working Together

Here’s how this could work, which we can
always customize to your specific needs.

Step 1: Understanding Your Communications Questions and Challenges

The first step is a basic discovery process, where I get a better sense of what you are looking for and specifically where you are looking for change.  This is typically done through a combination of individual and group interviews via phone or Zoom video calls.

I am also seeking the underlying questions that you are hoping to resolve. Here are some examples of the types of questions that often surface during this kind of consulting arrangement:

  • Are you seeking changes to the pace or volume of communications, the mix of communications channels, and other decisions you’d find in an editorial calendar?
  • Are you seeking changes to the content creation and approval process, including who does what and when? And who gets to review and approve that work?
  • Where is there doubt, stress, or conflict about the current way that communications work gets done?
  • Are there assumptions that need questioning or validation?
  • Where is FOMO (fear of missing out) at work?
  • Are there other trust or control issues at work?

Step 2 (Optional): Reviewing Current Communications Work Products 

I can provide an unbiased review of what you are doing now compared to best practices. I’ll share feedback verbally during an online meeting. Please note that I do not provide written reports.

Step 3: Decision Making on What’s Needed, Including Specific Strategic and Planning Documents 

There is no single master document or process that covers everything. It’s really a collection of documents and processes, with varying levels of breadth and depth on goals, strategies, objectives, and tactics. I am happy to provide more details on the various options, but they include strategic plans addressing the big questions of audience, brand, and messaging; big picture communications timelines; content creation, review, and approval workflows; creative briefs; campaign plans; editorial calendars and more. You likely need to create some but not all of these from scratch. I won’t ask you to create a document that’s never looked at again — everything the team creates will be referred back to regularly or used day to day.

If you are seeking a more focused coaching relationship on how one or more people work together to produce effective communications, our time together will more likely be spent on helping you make better and more confident decisions, building trust and skills, and/or streamlining internal processes and communications, rather than on creating documents.

Step 4: Working Through Key Decisions and Building Needed Documents

Once we know exactly what you need to create, we will begin asking and answering the necessary questions to build the documents or the new process. I will provide outlines or examples to guide staff as we go.  We will most likely talk weekly during this stage of the process to ensure that the team stays on track.

Step 5: Wrapping Up with Next Steps

We’ll close with a discussion of recommended next steps. This will likely include leadership practices, team growth and structure, and ongoing staff professional development.

How Much Will This Cost?

The minimum fee for private coaching and consulting is $5,000 (USD). Projects that take several months to complete or that involve large teams often reach $25,000 or more.

Please note that I do not respond to RFPs. Much of what I would put in an RFP is what you can read here or what we would discuss in an initial conversation.

I am willing to do a confidential proposal for you, as long as you have narrowed down the candidates for the work to no more than three consultants, including me. No fishing expeditions, please.

Please know, however, that I am rarely the lowest bidder. I know the value of my experience and expertise, and I price my services accordingly and fairly. If the low bid is a major criterion in your decision making, please do not request a proposal.

Another Option:
The Communications Director Mentoring Program

If you are primarily seeking training and coaching for a single person — usually a communications director — our Communications Director Mentoring Program may be a better fit than private coaching.

It’s more affordable ($3,000 for a six-month program) and does include some individual coaching. However, it’s a group program with a total of 16 communications directors from around the country (and often including some international participants as well). It follows a set program and does not allow the same level of customization or organizational work that private team coaching does.

The Communications Director Mentoring Program runs twice a  year, January to June and July to December. Registration opens in October for the early session and April for the later session.

Ready to Talk about the Possibilities?

If you’d like to talk about working together, please get in touch for an initial conversation. You can email me or call my cell phone at 336-870-0251 to begin the conversation.