About Us
About NANA
There is a moment that many business professionals know well. You are at a networking event, drink in hand, working the room with the practiced ease of someone who has done this dozens of times before. You have a great conversation with someone across the table, exchange cards, and walk away genuinely energized by the connection. And then — nothing. Life gets busy, the follow-up email never gets sent, and six months later you find that card at the bottom of a drawer and can barely remember the context in which it was exchanged. It is not that the connection was not real. It is that the environment in which it was made was never designed to make it last. Professional networking, for all the time and money invested in it, has a follow-through problem — and most professionals sense it even if they cannot quite name it. NANA was built to solve exactly that.
The Nonprofit Advocates Networking Alliance — NANA — sits at the intersection of two familiar models that have each, on their own, delivered real but limited value. The first is the professional networking group, which brings business professionals together regularly to build relationships and exchange referrals. The second is the civic organization, which grounds community members in a sense of shared responsibility and commitment to something larger than themselves. NANA takes both models and combines them into something more powerful than either could be alone. Rather than simply exchanging referrals or engaging in project-based volunteer opportunities, NANA members direct their time, skills, and professional expertise toward a single nonprofit organization each month — creating focused, sustained partnerships that benefit the business professional, the nonprofit, and the community in which they both live and work.
The mechanics of how NANA works are elegantly simple. NANA Clubs are formed within a Region and hosted monthly by a nonprofit organization at a consistent day and time. Each meeting is one hour long and follows a structured format: time to mingle and connect with fellow members and guests, a quick roundtable of introductions, a thirty-minute advisory session in which the host nonprofit brings a real challenge or opportunity to the room, and a wrap-up in which commitments are made and takeaways are captured. NANA provides a trained meeting facilitator who works alongside the nonprofit representative to ensure every meeting runs smoothly and produces genuine value. After each meeting, members receive a recap email with action items and attendee contact information — because the relationships built in the room are meant to continue well beyond it.
What makes NANA genuinely different from anything else in the networking or civic engagement landscape is the way it creates value simultaneously for everyone involved. For business professionals, it offers deeper relationships, a meaningful way to give back, an ever-expanding network, and a platform to demonstrate expertise in front of peers who matter. For nonprofits, it provides consistent access to professional talent that most organizations could never afford on the open market, a growing community of engaged advocates, and a revenue share from membership dues that requires zero administrative burden on the organization. And for the broader community, it creates an ecosystem of stronger nonprofits, more civically engaged professionals, and a growing culture of purposeful collaboration that lifts everyone. This is not a zero-sum exchange — it is a model in which every participant wins more as the network grows.
NANA is not just a new kind of networking group. It's not just a new civic organization. It is a new way of thinking about what it means to be a professional in your community — one that asks not just what your network can do for you, but what you and your network can do for the place you call home. It is built on the belief that the most powerful professional relationships are not the ones forged over a cocktail and a business card, but the ones built through shared purpose, consistent presence, and genuine contribution to something that matters. Whether you are a business professional looking for a network with real depth, a nonprofit leader searching for sustained support, or simply someone who believes that business and community are stronger together, NANA was built with you in mind. The model is proven, the community is growing, and the impact is real.
About IXI
The driving force behind MAMA (and NANA), WebIXI, Inc. (IXI), has decades of firsthand experience at the intersection of nonprofits, business, and community engagement. With more than 30 years working directly in the nonprofit sector, IXI understands the realities nonprofits face—from funding sustainability and board development to marketing, storytelling, and mission alignment.
For the past 10 years, IXI has also successfully hosted the Nonprofit Advisory Group, bringing nonprofit leaders together for peer learning, collaboration, and strategic growth. More recently, three years of hosting Downtime Networking has demonstrated IXI’s ability to cultivate consistent, high-trust professional communities that prioritize relationships over transactions.
Together, this depth of experience allows IXI to design NANA as a thoughtful, sustainable model that balances nonprofit needs, member value, and long-term community impact.
About MAMA
The Mid Atlantic Marketing Alliance (MAMA) is a collaborative powerhouse, offering clients access to an elite network of marketing experts who work together to deliver comprehensive, data-driven marketing strategies. Through its unique model, MAMA brings together experienced marketing professionals — Graphic Designers, Website Developers, Social Media Marketers, SEO experts, Videographers, etc. — who pool their skills to create customized marketing roadmaps that align with each client's specific goals and budgets. This tailored approach means businesses of all sizes can benefit from high-level marketing leadership without the financial burden of a full-time hire, ensuring strategic marketing support is both scalable and flexible as the business evolves.
NANA Susquehanna Regional Sponsors
