I was a broadcast journalist locally and nationally for 20 years. Now I run Pearl Impact Media. I help nonprofits and purpose-driven businesses raise money, raise awareness, and separate themselves from the rest through meaningful, memorable, and affordable video storytelling. That’s my mission. This podcast, DOT ORG, is an offshoot of that mission. Each episode I chat with a nonprofit leader with a defined, thoughtful, and successful approach to telling their organization’s story.

As I record this, it’s early January. If you work with or lead a nonprofit, you’re probably either figuring out and embarking on your strategic game plans for the year. If that plan includes video – and it absolutely should, because of all the ways video tells your story best – I want to provide a framework for how to determine your investment in 2026. This is your nonprofit's video game plan for 2026. We talk larger strategy, dive into the two paths for video storytelling, and for each you’ll leave with three questions/prompts to get yourself and your organization started with investing in video in the year ahead.

I was a broadcast journalist locally and nationally for 20 years. Now I run Pearl Impact Media. I help nonprofits and purpose-driven businesses raise money, raise awareness, and separate themselves from the rest through meaningful, memorable, and affordable video storytelling. That’s my mission. This podcast, DOT ORG, is an offshoot of that mission. Each episode I chat with a nonprofit leader with a defined, thoughtful, and successful approach to telling their organization’s story.

As someone who spends my days making videos for nonprofits, I always admire the nonprofits that have a clearly defined strategy for video. And in Atlanta, a recent client of mine is a perfect example.

FreeRent.Org is a young nonprofit, but you wouldn’t know it by their video output. They post everywhere, from Instagram to LinkedIn. They use videos on their web site. And they recently brought me in for a video specifically geared at a major fundraising event. They do it on all fronts, and they do it well. My guest is Ashley Stewart, the executive director of FreeRent.Org, with a thoughtful look into how they thrive.

FREERENT.ORG IMPACT VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PW8Y16ryv34

This is Episode 10. It’s a milestone episode. Double digits. And in each of the first nine, I can tell you how I feel when I finish listening. Invigorated. Ready to get out there and do what I love for this space. And thankful for all the nuggets of insight provided by our guest.

I want to try to capture that in this episode by mining those insights, specifically those about video. We’re switching it up a bit. No guest today … it’s just me. And I’ll be going through ten lessons from ten episodes of Dot Org about nonprofit storytelling through video. We all know video can be complicated. It can be intimidating. It can challenging. And that’s just doing one video, let alone building a strategy around it. But not only is it possible to fundraise and raise awareness through video, I’d say it’s essential for long-term growth.