2025 Nonprofit Storytelling Conference
Open Call for Session Submissions
Storytellers are the most powerful people in the world
Hey, storytelling friends!
The Nonprofit Storytelling Conference is celebrating 12 years of helping nonprofits raise more money and tell stories that generate enthusiasm around their cause.
If you’re passionate about storytelling and fundraising, and your superpower is teaching busy nonprofit pros how to do both better, we’d love to hear from you. (That superpower means helping attendees take specific action steps that will transform their fundraising and marketing.)
A few things to note if you want to join our speaker family:
- You pass the BBQ test. From the very first conference, we’ve chosen speakers who would also be fun to hang out with at a backyard BBQ. That means having a personality that is warm, fun, and personable.
- You find value and joy in traveling to conferences and speaking in front of people. We are not able to offer a stipend to speakers this year. But as always, we’re intentional about working with you to understand your marketing goals and offer opportunities for you to connect with our extensive community beyond just the conference.
- You are comfortable teaching at a tactical level. That means speaking less on the WHY and zeroing in on the HOW. For our attendees, knowing they’ll leave your session with the comfort and confidence to try a strategy on their own is the main reason they’re at our conference. As a speaker, you’ll teach clearly defined and easy-to-understand steps for a strategy that solves a specific problem.
- You are a big fan of collegiality, relationships, and lifelong learning. We look for speakers confident enough to admit if they don’t know the answer to a question and knowledgeable enough about the sector to point to other speakers or exhibitors at the conference who may have better answers.
Okay, so you made it this far. Still interested? One last thing.
While we’re always on the lookout for great session ideas, we’re on the lookout for submissions related to the following topic areas especially (examples are actual session ideas requested by our attendees):
- How to make a story-based ask (e.g. how to structure your ask using a storytelling framework; how to seamlessly transition from story to solicitation without breaking the emotional connection)
- How to use Email + Storytelling to raise money for free (e.g. how to craft subject lines that demand to be opened; how to structure your email story for maximum impact in minimal time)
- How to choose the best stories to inspire your donors to give (e.g. how to identify stories that align with donor motivations; how to build a story bank that serves multiple fundraising channels)
- How to get legacy gifts with the help of storytelling (e.g. how to weave future impact stories into your legacy conversations; how to help donors see themselves in your organization's long-term story)
- How to tell stories that move people to give -- even if you're a hard to raise money for organization (e.g. how to make "boring" causes compelling through storytelling; how to turn complex missions into donor-friendly narratives)
- How to plan your event to be story-focused and raise more money (e.g. how to structure your event timeline for maximum emotional impact; how to weave multiple storytelling elements throughout your program)
- How to make your donor communication stand out with "Instant Stories" (e.g. how to craft powerful micro-narratives for social media; how to tell compelling stories in 30 seconds or less)
- How to raise your profile in the community using stories (e.g. how to train board members to be storytelling ambassadors; how to leverage community partnerships to amplify your stories)
The speaker submission form is below. Once you've filled it out and click 'submit' you'll get an email that includes all of your responses.
The submission window will close on February 14, 2025.
2025 Speaker Submission Form
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