Shannon Ritchie
Expert
Founder and Principal Consultant at
Nectar Strategies
Durham, North Carolina
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Shannon Ritchie
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Contact Information
Company Name
Nectar Strategies
Position
Founder and Principal Consultant
Short Description
I help organizations gain data-driven insight, create digital & communications strategies that align with mission and goals, and optimize content and outreach.
Website
Email Address
shannon@hellonectar.co
Location
Durham, North Carolina
United States
United States
About Me and My Work
What kinds of projects, tasks, or challenges do you typically partner with nonprofits on?
Analytics + Optimization
Explore data on your work or audiences to help you build better websites, inform your social media strategy, and give you unique and timely information to share with stakeholders. Move forward with a clear content strategy, leaning in to what works and trying new tactics.
Communications Strategy
Clarify your goals, learn about the decision-makers who can help you meet them, and guide your team through a strategy process to create a roadmap for how you engage with external audiences.
Brand Identity + Messaging
Refresh or create a more compelling brand. Develop key messaging and talking points on your work. Tell great stories that resonate with your intended audience. Ensure your most important messengers are ready to share them.
Software and Tools
Get support in selecting the right CRM system to help you grow, navigating new social media channels, or making the most of existing email marketing and website platforms.
Website Design & Development
Build responsive, engaging, intuitive websites on WordPress or Squarespace that enable you to make ongoing changes, never having to rely on or wait for anyone else to make small edits for you.
Online Public Discourse
I specialize in organizing online facilitated conversations that center and lift up expertise of directly impacted people and frontline organizations, leading to more productive conversations and less trolls.
Explore data on your work or audiences to help you build better websites, inform your social media strategy, and give you unique and timely information to share with stakeholders. Move forward with a clear content strategy, leaning in to what works and trying new tactics.
Communications Strategy
Clarify your goals, learn about the decision-makers who can help you meet them, and guide your team through a strategy process to create a roadmap for how you engage with external audiences.
Brand Identity + Messaging
Refresh or create a more compelling brand. Develop key messaging and talking points on your work. Tell great stories that resonate with your intended audience. Ensure your most important messengers are ready to share them.
Software and Tools
Get support in selecting the right CRM system to help you grow, navigating new social media channels, or making the most of existing email marketing and website platforms.
Website Design & Development
Build responsive, engaging, intuitive websites on WordPress or Squarespace that enable you to make ongoing changes, never having to rely on or wait for anyone else to make small edits for you.
Online Public Discourse
I specialize in organizing online facilitated conversations that center and lift up expertise of directly impacted people and frontline organizations, leading to more productive conversations and less trolls.
Why would someone choose to work with you?
I have a hands-on approach. I intentionally founded Nectar Strategies as a consultancy and not an agency. I believe in building the right partnerships to fit the work and as such, avoid having the overhead and generalized knowledge that come with agencies. Rather, we are embedded in public policy and social change work, have deep expertise in the space, and are able to provide a higher level of service. I seek lasting relationships with my client partners. This model means I never take on more than I can handle and have space to fully immerse myself in your mission, goals, audiences, and brand. I become part of your team.
I am a strategic thinker that also knows how to complete projects. Social change doesn’t happen by chance. It’s the result of countless hours of planning, execution, assessment, (rinse and repeat) for years. Grounded in my public policy expertise, I see the forest but my experience in the field means I know how to navigate through the trees, too. I build logic models that link communications to overall organizational strategy, identify ways to measure each tactic you plan to use, and analyze data to assess progress. And I've also walked in your shoes and value your expertise as someone who is closest to the issue and the communities that champion your work. Strong messaging is important, but so is walking the talk. With me, you’ll have a partner that asks a lot of questions and looks for proof that you are doing what you say.
I help my client partners gain insight. Often, I hear from clients that communicating in the digital age is complex, messy, and tough to navigate. Algorithms change constantly, new platforms emerge faster than we can blink, and just when you think you understand how hashtags, something new pops up that leaves you scratching your heads. I stay on top of the latest trends and ground my work in research and best practices from the field. To do so, I make time to read, challenge myself through whiteboarding sessions with fellow practitioners, and tap into a vast network of creative thinkers around the country who I learn from and who shape my work.
I am committed to equity and justice. I embed an intersectional and racial equity lens in my work and am continuously challenging myself and learning. I am intentional to not only avoid harm and erasure of marginalized individuals and communities in our communications strategies, but actively prioritize and center directly impacted people in conversations about social and policy change as critical and important experts. We are also committed to pay equity and work to correct existing imbalances in freelance and consulting practices.
I am a strategic thinker that also knows how to complete projects. Social change doesn’t happen by chance. It’s the result of countless hours of planning, execution, assessment, (rinse and repeat) for years. Grounded in my public policy expertise, I see the forest but my experience in the field means I know how to navigate through the trees, too. I build logic models that link communications to overall organizational strategy, identify ways to measure each tactic you plan to use, and analyze data to assess progress. And I've also walked in your shoes and value your expertise as someone who is closest to the issue and the communities that champion your work. Strong messaging is important, but so is walking the talk. With me, you’ll have a partner that asks a lot of questions and looks for proof that you are doing what you say.
I help my client partners gain insight. Often, I hear from clients that communicating in the digital age is complex, messy, and tough to navigate. Algorithms change constantly, new platforms emerge faster than we can blink, and just when you think you understand how hashtags, something new pops up that leaves you scratching your heads. I stay on top of the latest trends and ground my work in research and best practices from the field. To do so, I make time to read, challenge myself through whiteboarding sessions with fellow practitioners, and tap into a vast network of creative thinkers around the country who I learn from and who shape my work.
I am committed to equity and justice. I embed an intersectional and racial equity lens in my work and am continuously challenging myself and learning. I am intentional to not only avoid harm and erasure of marginalized individuals and communities in our communications strategies, but actively prioritize and center directly impacted people in conversations about social and policy change as critical and important experts. We are also committed to pay equity and work to correct existing imbalances in freelance and consulting practices.