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 “Some people think that marketing is a “bad” word used by business to cheat people and stimulate sales, - says marketing expert Terry Mattison (USA) – Sometimes it happens and in such case marketing is used not in a proper way.”

Institute of leadership and management of UCU decided to ask Ukrainian NGOs how do they understand marketing and how they use it in a daily work. During February-April 2011 a sociologic poll “Effectiveness of using non-commercial marketing by Ukrainian NGOs” was held. Its aim was to learn and analyze experience of usage of non-commercial marketing in Ukraine.

First mentioning about using marketing in non-profit sector were made by Philip Kotler and Sidney Levy in the end of 1960^th. Since than a lot of works dedicated to non-commercial marketing of Ukrainian and international authors appeared. The main distinctive feature of non-commercial marketing is reaching previously established goals by satisfying needs of the target group. Unfortunately, the research proved that marketing is only a tool for relationships with donors.

Most of the organizations associate marketing with advertising and pay little attention to marketing studies (only 2% of respondents assume market studies to be the most important component of marketing).

There are a lot of discussions about the interest philanthropy now, the ideas  are offered to Supreme Council of Ukraine as a separate law. But the fact that only 19 % of interviewed organizations actively use marketing means that very small amount of organizations will  have a claim on offered 2 % of tax transfer.

Even if mentioned law is in a distant perspective already now organizations are looking for some alternatives to grant money. And it is impossible to do without deep studying of target groups’ needs.

At certificate programs of the Institute of leadership and management Marketing is an obligatory course. And we are planning new educational initiatives that will help NGOs to work out effective marketing strategies.