ADL

Under the leadership of its chief executive, Jonathan Greenblatt, the ADL has spent the last two years modernizing its technology, with a goal of getting all 25 of the organization’s regional offices working more closely.

The emphasis on improving communications between staffers has begun to reap dividends for the group, including its fundraising, says Amy Blumkin, vice president of brand and marketing at ADL.

How has ADL changed its approach under Jonathan Greenblatt’s tenure?

Blumkin: Just two years ago, our marketing department existed on its own. Like all of our teams, we lived in a silo. We knew we had to change how we do things. When you bring in a new tech platform or do a comprehensive rebranding, as we were doing simultaneously, you won’t be successful if you’re working narrowly.

We’ve made some big changes. Now, the marketing team has become conjoined with the communications team in Jonathan’s office. And as we’ve become more data-focused, we’ve worked closely with the IT team to implement all of these new things. It’s been a great help as we try to improve our branding efforts.

Jonathan is instilling a culture that values collaboration, one based on mutual respect and around the idea of bringing together people with different perspectives. That’s the half of it.

We’ve also migrated pretty much everything over to Salesforce, starting with our hate incident report operations. We wanted to create one coherent platform so we could document our reports, track incidents and responses, and note where we’re most needed. From that, we began to see how efficient the ADL could become in spotting trends, designing our responses to them, and how we could optimize other programs across all of our regional offices. We’re becoming a more tightly knit organization because of that.

At the same time, and with help from Salesforce, we’re making sure our rebranding helps all of our departments reinforce our message and that we all look and sound the same.

What has that meant for the departments that are entrusted with fundraising?

 We can use all that information about hate crimes to understand where the ADL’s work is needed, both in terms of regions and issues. Having that info helps us learn what stories are out there that we can share with members and other potential donors. We can use our various teams to tell those stories so that we get more people involved and giving.

How has the more modern approach to technology led more ADL staffers to work together?

It has allowed us to combine some of our teams, such as marketing and sales. The development and marketing teams have also become more integrated, which helps us strengthen our brand. Before, we were order-takers and were strictly directed by our leadership team. Now, we can be more creative and collaborative on our own about campaigns and getting our message out to the public. The marketing team understands that its role in the chain is to develop the narratives that explain what the ADL does. Other teams—sales, development—realize that it’s very important to tell the same stories. There’s more consistency in our message. We’re starting to achieve more resonance with donors because of this.

Has working more closely with other teams improved the ADL’s ability to raise money?

 It’s a little early to produce numbers that would confirm that. But the early indications are that we’re doing better. From an organizational standpoint, we’re sharing information more regularly than we had been. There’s a synergy and understanding that’s developing. Being aware of what each team is doing gives us advantages that will help us raise money in the longer term.

The marketing team has begun to collaborate more with development to learn how we can craft messages so people can better understand the value of our work, perhaps even become more engaged in it. This year, with help from the development team, we started a series of emails we call “drumbeats.” They’re designed to share information with our members. ADL’s work is based on informing our constituents. We want to make sure that we don’t include an ask in every email we send out. You need to do more than make appeals for money.

Using the data we now have also helps us understand who our audience is, both in terms of donors and prospects. So, the picture we have of the people we’re communicating with is much clearer.

Has the increase in collaborative work across teams offered the ADL any other advantages?

It gives more horsepower to the brand. Any time you get people talking and living the same message, you sharpen the picture of what you’re about—the picture the public sees. And that will help with fundraising too.