A couple of weeks ago, after John Hill’s appearance on the Keynote podcast, Ryan Catherwood and I talked about the ways that higher ed can not only remain relevant but differentiate itself in today’s climate. I said that anyone in engagement who was really listening to what Hill had to say about the importance of alumni communities should be excited.
“I think all communities have gone through the roof because people are going to be craving authentic, trusted relationships,” he said. “Figuring out how to develop lifelong engagement that’s meaningful for people, those organizations will reap the rewards long-term.”
We live in a tech-driven world where people aren’t always sure they’re talking to a human being or someone who has their best interests at heart. In that world, community and genuine human connection are key. And that’s what alumni engagement sells.
“Community and genuine human connection” sounds a lot like “radical connection”—a concept Nathan Chappell champions in his book, The Generosity Crisis: The Case for Radical Connection to Solve Humanity’s Greatest Challenges. He elaborated on radical connection in his recent appearance on the Keynote podcast.
“Affiliation and association no longer work,” Chappell says. “It’s not just I know you or you know me. … I think it requires a new openness in that kind of authenticity and transparency that the synthetic world won’t do readily.”
But knowing that connection is what people crave is only half the equation. The other half is building something around it that no one else can replicate. That’s a strategy question as much as a values one. “Radical connection” sounds a lot like “inimitable product”—a concept Rand Fishkin described in a recent post.
Fishkin, the founder of the audience research platform SparkToro, was speaking specifically about the challenge of creating content in this era where Google’s AI is now cannibalizing web traffic. He offers two solutions. One of them is “build inimitable products”—a.k.a., create something that only you can deliver. In the post, Fishkin gives some advice about how to do that:
Step 1: Find where your unique offering overlaps with a gap in the market and what your audience desperately wants.
Step 2: Build that “overlapping thing” in a way that’s simple to explain and “easily amplified by a rabid fan.”
Step 3: Promote this product through the venues and channels where your audiences live. He lists the usual targets like social media and advertising, but also cites “word of mouth (which may soon return to its 20th-Century position as the MVP of marketing channels).”
These are big, deep questions that won’t be answered over the course of a single summer retreat. We all know the “let’s just do what we’ve always done” roadblock in higher ed is hard to break, for many reasons.
But your summer retreat in a couple of weeks could be where the seed of your “inimitable product” gets planted. Maybe you use that time to talk only about Step 1. Bat around ideas for what your unique offering might be. Build the skeleton of a strategy for alumni and donor outreach to discover what, exactly, they want from you. Set a date for six months from now when you’ll reconvene to sift through your data and find where the answers converge with one another and the ideas you collected at the retreat.
Small steps matter, and now is the time to start taking them. AI has opened a window for higher ed and nonprofit engagement by making human-to-human connection a luxury item. As Chappell notes, there’s never been a better time for these organizations to assert their advantage in this competition for connection.
“What we describe as ‘radical connection’ goes back to things like, ‘Where do I belong?’ ‘Where is my sense of belonging?’ ‘Who am I?’ ‘What am I here for?’” he says. “For the nonprofit industry, if we’re ready for that and we approach it in the right way, then there’s a huge opportunity there.”
Kristin Simonetti Hanson is an award-winning editorial content strategist, writer, and editor based in Baltimore, Md.
For nearly 20 years, she’s served higher ed and nonprofit organizations with her distinctive, creative voice and sharp, strategic insight, turning complex priorities into clear, compelling narratives. In 2021—after working in-house for Johns Hopkins University, the University of North Carolina Wilmington, The Washington Center for Internships and Academic Seminars, and Elon University—she went out on her own, founding Kristin Hanson Writes, LLC.
Big Themes This Week
The future Nathan calls “N1 philanthropy” treats every supporter as an individual an “N of one” rather than a member of a crude, averages-based segment, with predictive, generative, and agentic AI finally making that level of personalization possible at scale.
AI’s greatest value in advancement may not be efficiency or output, but the time it gives back — a “dividend of time” that frees fundraisers to do the deeply human work technology cannot.
Applying AI to a transactional or flawed fundraising practice only accelerates the problem; technology amplifies whatever culture and intent already exist.
The challenge facing institutions is fundamentally a relationship and connection problem, not a generosity problem, people remain generous when they feel genuinely known.
Keeping the “human at the helm” with people directing and accountable for how AI is used is what allows technology to deepen relationships rather than make engagement more transactional.
Team Discussion Questions
Where are we still segmenting donors and alumni by averages rather than treating them as individuals, and where could AI help us build a relationship with someone as an “N of one”?
If AI gave every member of our team a day a week back, what human work would we want them spending it on?
Which of our current tasks drain time and joy, and which are the “last mile” moments that actually build relationships?
Where is it essential that a human stays “at the helm” of any AI we adopt, and how do we keep AI-assisted outreach feeling authentic rather than automated?
Do our donors and alumni feel known by us, or processed by us and what makes our institution worth connecting with between asks?
