524: Find a Cause, Make a Difference, and Change the World: Fundraising, Charity, and Volunteering with Kelsey Bradley

Speaker 1 0:00 Marketer of the day. Episode 524, find a cause, make a difference and change the world, fundraising charity and volunteering with Kelsey Bradley.

Robert Plank 0:10 Hey, everyone. We're so glad that you're listening to the marketer of the day podcast. We're talking with Kelsey Bradley. And Kelsey founded her nonprofit, which is called Design cause Inc, nine months after graduating from university, and within a year, she raised $35,000 enough to build a series of classrooms she had designed while in school. And with that, she moved on to other bigger and better projects. And she is passionate about business and about helping others, which she feels are intrinsically connected. So we're going to hear all about what kelsey's mission is, what her dreams are, what she's built, what she's done, what's coming up next. So Kelsey, glad to be talking to

Kelsey Bradley 0:48 you. Yeah, thanks. I'm glad to be here.

Robert Plank 0:49 All right. So, um, so yeah, can you kind of fill us in in your own words, like i What do you all about and what do you have going on these days?

Kelsey Bradley 0:58 Uh, well, my main gig is design cause which you mentioned. It's a nonprofit organization that works collaboratively with communities in need in the developing world. And what we do is we work with them to design and build educational buildings. So you mentioned, I had finished a school in Cameroon, and now the next project is also a school in Malawi. So that's the, the main focus, and it's really exciting, engaging work, which is, which is really awesome.

Robert Plank 1:31 Well, great. And I feel sort of sort of stupid here, like maybe I should have failed geography. But where the heck is Cameroon and where's Malawi?

Kelsey Bradley 1:40 Okay, so that's a pretty common question. Cameroon is an African country. It's where Western and Central Africa meet next to Nigeria, just to the east of Nigeria, and the west of Chad and Congo. The easiest way for me to describe it is, if you're looking at a map of Africa, kind of where that Western bulge meets up with the rest of the continent. I refer lovingly refer to it as the armpit. That's where Cameroon is, and then Malawi is another African country that's much smaller. It's in the southern hemisphere, and it's north east of South Africa, bordering Mozambique, Tanzania and Zambia, I believe.

Robert Plank 2:26 Okay, great. I have a picture in my head now. I just feel like sort of a one of those dumb Americans, like maybe I probably only know like two thirds of the countries, not all those really obscure, tiny ones, and so these kind of smaller, obscure countries in Africa. Why did you choose these places out of all the areas in the world, all the things that you could have done? What made you decide on this?

Kelsey Bradley 2:50 Well, really, I started I was in architecture school when I started this, and the main reason why I got involved in it is because I was frustrated with what I was learning in architecture school, I felt like, you know, how much can a high rise office building or fancy residential home really help humanity? And I went looking for my own project that I could volunteer on or just get involved with. And then this project in Cameroon, I had a connection in my local community, which that I didn't know about, and we just it, just it grew very organically. It took a while. I mean, when I first heard about the project, four years before it actually happened. So, I mean, in the same thing in Malawi, I had a somewhat local connection. But I have to tell you, Cameroon is a really big country. It It's French speaking, so we don't hear a lot about it, but Africa in general is, like, weirdly skewed on the map, like it's a massive continent, but, you know, the way they draw it, it makes the countries look really small, which I didn't know until I was there.

Robert Plank 4:04 Well, good, good thing that you traveled and broadened your horizons there. So it took, it took four years for this sort of thing to come together. And, I mean, how does that sort of thing even happen? Like, I know, like in your body, we mentioned that you designed these schools. There was a fundraising period. Like, what are the steps to going from I have this connection, I want to help out, from, how do you go from like the idea, to actually the reality?

Kelsey Bradley 4:28 That's a That's a good question. It wasn't linear. When I first sort of got connected with the project, I didn't do that much for a while. I was just sort of thinking about the design or thinking about what I could do, and then I zoned in more when I decided I would make it part of an independent study at my university. So I made one semester was exclusively devoted to doing research, because Cameroon, I mean, I didn't know any. Think about Cameroon. So I spent three, three months heavily researching, and about six months in total researching. And then from there, I moved into the design phase, which took five, maybe six months. And then, and then I moved into the actual fundraising creation of the organization, which happened after I graduated, but I didn't originally, I didn't think it was going to have to start an organization. I naively thought that, you know, I'll design it, it'll be great, and then people will be excited and give me money, which is just not what happened? So I quickly realized, okay, I have to do this the right way. And then I stumbled through all the layers of creating an organization, and then I had to learn how to fundraise on my feet. And the full fundraising period took a year, but really 90% of the money came in in the last two months so, and then I just went and did it. So it took, I mean, it was, it was drawn out, but I would say that from when I actually started the organization to completion of the project was about a year and four months,

Robert Plank 6:19 okay, and that's great. And hearing about the different, like processes you went through and, like the research and the organization, it sounds like you had to figure a lot of things out along the way and jump through a lot of hoops and all that kind of thing. And so it has a wondering, like, out of those, those few years of, you know, doing all the research and, you know, all the fundraising and things like that, how the heck did you stick with it? Do you have any point where you felt like giving up

Kelsey Bradley 6:46 many, many points? I think in the beginning, I wasn't, I mean, I was interested in it, but I wasn't super committed. I decided that I would go to Cameroon in between in my last two semesters of college university, because I just couldn't get the research done. I mean, there was no information out there. There was a little bit written in French, which, I mean, my French is not good enough to read academic literature in French, so that was challenging. And I just sort of made this knee jerk decision that I was going to go there so I could do first hand research, which wasn't, I mean, it was an impulsive decision, for sure, I spent a few weeks there, but after actually going and experiencing it and meeting the children at the school, then it was at that point that I became really committed to the project, throughout the fundraising, I wanted to stop. I mean, many, many times along the way, the fundraising was really hard when you don't have any connections and you're brand new, and nobody believes you when you say you're going to do something. That piece was very challenging, but I just couldn't, couldn't give up on the on the kids, so that's really what got me through. Well,

Robert Plank 8:05 cool, yeah, I can. I can relate to that, not not exactly, but that idea of of being only sort of committed to something. And then once the human component gets involved, when it's like, you see someone that you can help in a certain way, then it's like, Whoa. That's that's a really powerful motivation, right there, once you actually, like, see, see what the result would be, or you meet the person that's going to affect so I can relate that in myself, as far as, like, some of the, like, the marketing stuff, or, like, I'm a computer programmer, and sometimes I would just kind of create silly programs that didn't do much. But then once I started actually talking to people and figuring out what it was they needed, then suddenly that that spark just came alive there, and it was like, Okay, now I'm not just blindly going forward for the heck of it. There's a there's a real person there that I want to that want to help out. So when you mentioned fundraising, so what sort of stuff did you have to do for the fundraising. Like, was there any, like, Kickstarter stuff, or did you have to do it the old fashioned way? Or what was that like? Well,

Kelsey Bradley 9:06 the first thing I did was start to go fund me, which brought in, like, $400 and I was like, Oh, that's not gonna be enough. And then I realized that it Kickstarter, or, sorry, go fund me takes 8% so then I was like, Wait, where's the money going? So that was my first attempt. And then I started the organization, and I had to put a little bit of money into getting all the paperwork done and all of that. And I mean, at this point, personally, I'd spent a lot of money on on this, because I paid my way to Cameroon the first time, and I paid, you know, my living expenses and travel expenses and any government expenses. So I had put a fair amount of money into it. And I thought that I would be able to, you know, get on crowd rise and start a more formal Kickstarter campaign, and and then it would go for. From there, but I quickly found out that those campaigns are very challenging to run, and you really need to know what you're doing, which I didn't, and I did not have a wide enough support group at that group at that time to really facilitate that at all. So I tried a huge number of things. I mean, I can't even remember. I tried a lot of different things. Like tried to try to do like peer to peer fundraising and letters and all these other things. And just nothing was really working. And then I finally zeroed in and did, did events, and then I did one on one meetings with people. Almost everyone was in my network, my personal network, for the first project. And it was a lot of just face to face interactions, you know, like I said, hosting parties, inviting people, and I had to ask people, probably on average, three to five times before they would give make any donations. I think it really had to convince people that I was serious, which was very labor intensive, because they just they didn't believe me. I mean, I was right out of school, so,

Robert Plank 11:20 right. Well, it sounds like you were super dedicated as far as, like, trying all these crazy different things, doing the parties, following up three to five times. And so does this sort of thing come natural to you? Like, are you more of, like, a social person or more of a shy person?

Kelsey Bradley 11:37 I'm definitely extroverted, definitely I'm not the life of the party, though, I am very good at one on one conversations and fostering relationships in small groups or just one on one, that's really where I thrive. But I the thought of asking people for money is still very uncomfortable for me. I'm not a natural fundraiser in any way, but I think that I just didn't give up because I really, really wanted to get this project done, and it, it didn't really matter. I just had to get it done.

Robert Plank 12:16 Awesome. You found a way to make it work. Well, like, in order to to really like, like, like, push yourself outside your comfort zone and like, you know, talk to the people that you needed to talk to. Were there any things that that helped you, like, maybe like, advice that you wish you had when you started, as far as getting yourself out there and and, you know, taking these risks? Is there anything that maybe after, after doing this hundreds and hundreds or 1000s of times. Is there anything like you picked up? As far as those skills,

Kelsey Bradley 12:47 I would definitely say one thing that I had to learn through trial and error is your energy going into the meeting is really vitally important. You know, at a certain point in the fundraising, it was just going so badly, and I was so used to hearing now, and I would go in to the meeting or the ask, like, almost expecting a no, and people would pick up on that, and then it would almost always be a no. So, but it took me a really long time to realize that I had to, like, be excited about the project and really express how amazing it was, even if I wasn't really feeling it at that moment.

Robert Plank 13:32 Okay, yeah, that makes sense, that you like, it sounds like you like, tapped tapped into the root cause of why you started, right? You tapped into the the memory of how things were fun and exciting at the beginning, and maybe you were in that the middle, kind of rough part. But, um, but even if things are bad, that's that's no reason to let the badness, like, like, drag you, drag you down with you. And I can relate to that a lot, because, um, you know, sometimes I might be, like, having a bad day, or have, you know, have a fight with someone. And then my wife pointed out to me one time that, like, I was have, I think me and her got in an argument, and then I went into my office to, like, make a video or record a podcast. And even though we had just fought, like, the the sound of my voice was like, super, like, cheery and, you know, upbeat and stuff, and it wasn't fake, it was just that I had switched gears and kind of amped myself up for this other thing that I was doing. So, I mean, that's really good right there, that maybe some people out there don't even realize that if they're having a bad day or a bad couple of months or having that initial frustration in their business, don't let it show. Don't let it overtake you, especially when you're presenting yourself and asking for more money, right?

Kelsey Bradley 14:40 Yeah, exactly. And, and the other thing that I, honestly, I had read and I knew about, but I didn't actually understand, until my largest donor told me this. He was, he told me he was, like people like giving money, and it makes them feel good when you ask them for money, which I mean, I think that for different people. That's a different situation. But for somebody in their particular demographic, which happens to be my largest donor base, I think that that's true. You know, they've reached a point in their lives where it's almost a compliment that you would invite them into a project and ask them to donate to it, as opposed to, you know, maybe somebody in different demographic where they're really struggling and they're like, No, I don't want you to ask me for money, but you know it, I just didn't think that that was in any way possible, that somebody could be, you know, flattered or happy, that you would consider inviting them into the project and asking them for donations. So that helped me as well. But really what work is just giving myself an internal pep talk and being like, okay, Kelsey, go do it. That's, I mean, at the end of the day, that's really, that's really how I got it done,

Robert Plank 15:52 right? No one else is going to do it for you. And that's an interesting perspective, and that's a really good just life lesson in general, because I know that for me, sometimes I'll have, I'll have, I'll have some kind of conversation with someone, and I'll just, for whatever reason, sometimes assume the worst, right? Like, assume that someone, like, doesn't care, or they're uninterested, or feel like they're judging me, and then, and then I think about like, well, am I? Am I judging them? Well, no, I'm not. I'm being supportive of them. So it's really easy for the bad thoughts to creep in and assume the worst when really no, no one really cares that much, right? No one cares that much enough to to really judge us. And it's like, Why? Why let all, all that bad head trash, all that bad talk in and so, so it sounds like you've been on through quite an adventure here. And, I mean, it sounds like there were all kinds of challenges in there, but for like other people out there who might be doing something similar to this, where were there any, I mean, besides everything, were there any unexpected hiccups along the way that maybe, like other people should know about?

Kelsey Bradley 16:55 Yes, so I would say, I mean, everybody, if you're in this particular situation that I was in. I mean, everyone knows that fundraising is challenging, so I'm just going to assume that people think fundraising is hard. What I what was extremely hard that I didn't expect to be as hard was actually living in the developing world. So I was there for just over two months, which seems like a really short period of time, but I mean it, when you're so far out of your culture that you don't even know how to eat anymore, it is very challenging. And I thought that it was going to be, like, very exciting and, oh, like, gonna be on a trip for two months, and it's gonna be amazing, and it was really hard, like, a lot harder than I would have ever imagined. So I would definitely say that doing work in the developing world is very rewarding, but it's also a lot more challenging then I think it's easy to to believe that it is,

Robert Plank 18:05 yeah, that makes a lot of sense, and it makes me think of there's some kind of saying that's like, the purpose of life isn't to be happy, it's to become the person that you need, that you're meant to be. So like, you know, we want fulfillment. And it's easy to think that, Oh, I just want to have a million dollars and lay around, but if you had that, you'd be miserable because you wouldn't have anything to do. And so sometimes the struggle of, you know, slumming it, or going on an adventure or embarking on that journey, that in the long run, it is a lot is way cooler than something stupid, like someone winning the lottery, right?

Kelsey Bradley 18:41 Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, there's, there's so many challenges that it's, I mean, it's just like being totally ripped out of your comfort zone and then given no lifeline. That's probably how I would describe it, because I was there by myself, so I had no, no lifeline, really, so, but yeah, I mean, a lot of times people see their impression of something from the outside is very different than the reality of it. And I think that's exactly what you were saying as well, with winning the lottery and stuff, expecting it's going to be great and then it's not that great at the end,

Robert Plank 19:21 right? Yeah, and, and, yeah. So you've got, you've gone on on quite a journey, and it sounds like had a lot of fun and got a lot of cool things accomplished. So can you like, kind of, kind of recap for us and tell us, like, what, how did these projects work out? Like, the, it sounds like the is the Cameroon project finished with. And then the Malawi project is the one that's in progress. In progress right now? Yep,

Kelsey Bradley 19:45 yep. So I completed construction. Well, I mean, I personally didn't build it, but we completed the construction in March for the project in Cameroon, and I've been in touch with with the community there. They're still using the structure. Structures. They love them. They've been incredibly effective. And I'm in the process of fundraising for the new classrooms in Malawi, and I'm planning on moving over there during the summer months to do the same thing again and go through construction there.

Robert Plank 20:19 Super cool. So you made it work once, and you're now that you have the blueprint, you're using the blueprint somewhere else, right, exactly? Well, super awesome. And so, you know, something that I've always, like, never really had a good answer for myself is, you know, there are all of these great things that people like you were doing, all these, like, you know, great causes and things like that. And I always hear about, like, Oh, if you, if, you know, choose a great cause, like, you know, eradicating malaria, things like that, then you'll, you'll have, like, all this extra motivation and all this extra, like, meaning for to your life. And so if people out there, you know, if they're looking for that meaning to their life, I mean, where do you think they should start? Should they, like, look into helping out the these nonprofits like yours? Or if someone says, like, you know, I'm looking for some way to contribute somehow, what's your answer to that?

Kelsey Bradley 21:15 I would definitely say, get involved in an existing charity. I mean, there's so many things you could do. You could just volunteer where you live, you could go on a mission trip. You can make a donation. I mean, I think a lot of people don't realize like, when you make a donation to charity, especially a small charity, it goes a long way, and it can do a lot of good. Yeah. I mean, I would definitely say to volunteer or, you know, get involved in some way in an existing charity, instead of just jumping in and starting a charity like I did. I think, think I definitely took the tougher route. But there's so much that you can gain from even just couple hours a week of volunteering, right?

Robert Plank 22:03 I love it, just even that little bit. And then something else I've always wondered about is sometimes you hear that's like, the the smaller charities are better to contribute. Like, I think there was a period of time where, like, the Red Cross got all kinds of bad press because all these things came out that, like, a huge chunk of their money just went to, you know, paying for salaries or paying for stupid stuff, and then it was better to to help out these smaller charities. So is that completely false, or is that true? Or what do you think about that?

Kelsey Bradley 22:34 I think that it's a lot more nuanced than the media or people think the issues in my mind is that these larger charities, they in order to get the best people, they have to provide somewhat comparable salary packages to for profit businesses. And so that's why you see these large salary they're not as large as a for profit equivalent position, but they're still quite large. And then, you know, people really don't understand that you have to spend money to make money, and it's the same thing in a nonprofit sense. So if you stipulate that your donation can't be used for advertising, then you're not giving the organization a chance to use what you've given them to make more money that can benefit more people. So I think that there's that side of it, and then there's also the side of sometimes the charities just don't use their money appropriately. And it's really sad reality, and it reflects really badly on all other charities, especially ones that are scraping by and they don't spend any money on anything but the programs. So I definitely think that making a donation to a small or even medium sized charity, it's going to go further, because there's less infrastructure that has to be supported. But a lot of these larger organizations also have really well established systems. You know, my small organization of one or two, I mean, I can help in this one particular way, but a larger organization has a lot of different avenues of helping, so it's really more of finding a cause that you really resonate with and and trying to make a strong connection and relationship with them. And I would encourage that route, instead of trying to put your money where you know you believe the the biggest impact is going to be because there's a lot of variables. And you know, at the end of the day you you want to make sure your your money isn't going to an unethical cause, for sure, but I think sometimes people get scared to just donate, in general, because they hear all this bad press, and 99% of. Organizations are not doing shady stuff like that,

Robert Plank 25:03 right? Well, that's a really good answer that gives us a lot to think about that. It's, it's not quite, quite as black and white as sometimes it it might seem to be. So, I mean, so really good stuff there. And so how can the people listening here help you and your organization with what you're doing?

Kelsey Bradley 25:21 Well, the most straightforward way to work with design causes to give a donation, monetary donation, that is, we put a big emphasis into supporting the local economies that we we work in. So, you know, I make sure that I pay all local papers, and we purchase all our materials from local community. So I don't really bring anything from North America there. I want to make sure that I'm stimulating the local economy as much as possible. So that's the best way. And you can find information about that at the design cause website or on Facebook. It's design cause, inc.org, I'm sure you'll, you'll talk a little bit more about that, but that's the easiest way to get involved with design cause,

Robert Plank 26:14 super awesome. And I'm not even sure if this is like an appropriate question or a weird question, but is there an an average donation size? Because sometimes they hear about people, you know, like donating a little bit every single month, or, like, once a year around tax time, or just like once, and they move on, like, is there such a thing as an average donation size for your organization? Um,

Kelsey Bradley 26:37 yes, I would say, I mean, most donors donate once, maybe twice a year. I don't have regular donors like a monthly donation system right now, because I don't really have any administrative costs at all. So that would just go straight to just our program bucket. Anyway, I would say that I get donations that span in size from $5 to $10,000 so most people give between 102 $150 and then I have my larger handful of larger donors that really make a huge impact with their donations. But I mean, even $5 helps a lot. So there's no required to minimum or anything like that.

Robert Plank 27:34 Okay, well, great. So even five bucks will help and so, so right now you have the Malawi thing going on, and afterwards you have anything planned. Or is it just 100% focused on the current thing?

Kelsey Bradley 27:46 It's 100% focused on Malawi at this time, after I finished Cameroon, I got kind of inundated with requests to do different projects all over the world, and I had a pretty strict selection process, so putting all my energy into this project, and then we'll, we'll see what happens next.

Robert Plank 28:07 Well, super cool, exciting stuff. And, I mean, you can probably imagine Kelsey that sometimes I, I get kind of bored with this podcast, and I end up interviewing like, you know, the same kind of person over and over again, like some startup or someone who made some apps. So it's really cool to hear about the marketing side of things, the business that you've grown in something totally different than what we normally hear about. So this has been really cool hearing just about your your work ethic, your focus, your, you know, not giving up, your kind of troubleshooting the system and all. And it sounds like doing a heck a lot of stuff yourself being, you know, overseas, all by yourself figuring it out with like you. You said no safety net. So really great information, really great story, really inspiring stuff, and everyone here listening, if you want to check out more about what Kelsey has going on, if you want to look into her charity, design cause, then look them up on Facebook and check them out at design cause inc.org, and as Kelsey said, if you want to donate 250, $100 even $5 every little bit helps, you'll feel really good doing it, and maybe even talk to the accountant and figure out what kind of tax advantages that you get with that as well. So a bunch of different reasons to help out for this good cause. It's been great hearing about it, and thanks Kelsey for stopping by and sharing this with us.

Kelsey Bradley 29:25 Thanks so much. I had a great time.

Robert Plank 29:27 Thank you for listening to marketer of the day. Subscribe and listen to other shows at marketer of the day.com/episodes, you.