Introduction

For 10 years, OUTWORDS has captured, preserved, and shared the stories of LGBTQIA2S+ elders throughout the United States, to build community and catalyze social change. 

In 2025, OUTWORDS will mark some major milestones to cap off its first decade of life. The entire organization is in agreement about wanting to make a big splash, and leverage the timely moments to raise funds, strengthen its existing relationships and make new connections.

With a small but mighty team of communications experts across the Staff and Board, OUTWORDS needed an extra hand to create a long-term, cohesive plan that can support these grand, visionary goals. That’s why it turned to Mixte.

Together, we’re helping OUTWORDS plan its communications and marketing efforts at a higher level to position them for success in the next decade. 

Our Objectives

Create a plan to give OUTWORDS a strong, strategic communications foundation so that it can make the most of significant moments in its 10-year history.

Here’s how we’re doing it: 

  • We dug in — We interviewed staff and Board members, pored over preexisting communications materials as well as OUTWORDS’ own marketing data, and sketched an outline of the organization’s most important audiences.
  • We are getting creative — while keeping it realistic. OUTWORDS is a true expert at telling compelling human stories, and has a robust network of relationships with peer organizations and LGBTQIA2S+ leaders. That means it has a lot of potential to try new things and get even more creative with how it engages its audiences! And yet, while we delight in big ideas, we know the OUTWORDS’ team is busy running the organization — so our duty is also to embrace simplicity and enhance efficiency wherever we can. 
  • We’re learning along the way. OUTWORDS’ full calendar of events and programming during the 10th anniversary year is not yet set in stone, so it needs this plan to be adaptable to any changes or new opportunities we can’t yet foresee. That’s why every strategy we recommend is intentionally built to be scaled up or down as the organization needs. 

The Outcome

As of fall 2024, we are working closely with OUTWORDS to refine the plan. Stay tuned for more updates!