Marketing Strategist and Fundraising Leader for Catholic Nonprofits
Matt Paolelli is the managing director of White Tree, a marketing and fundraising consultancy dedicated to helping Catholic nonprofits grow their reach, deepen their impact, and advance their missions.
- Track record of raising millions of dollars and building successful digital strategies from the ground up
- Specializes in donor cultivation, compelling content creation, social media strategy, and integrated marketing communications
- Online and direct mail fundraising leader with experience stewarding communities and converting leads into donors
- Award-winning campaigns that have garnered thousands of new leads, inspired significant media attention, and raised millions for Catholic causes
- Dynamic leader who thrives on collaboration, experimentation, and creative problem-solving
Over the past decade, he has served in senior marketing and development leadership roles at some of the country’s most prominent Catholic organizations, where he has raised millions of dollars, launched award-winning campaigns, and built marketing strategies from the ground up.
Most recently, Matt served as the vice president of marketing for Real Life Catholic, an evangelization apostolate founded by Chris Stefanick, where he oversaw all marketing and communications efforts, online fundraising, and media relations. In just eight months, he grew RLC’s email list by 25,000, added more than 200,000 YouTube subscribers, and nearly doubled recurring monthly revenue by adding 1,400 new monthly donors.
He previously served as the development marketing director at Word on Fire Catholic Ministries, a role that blended his marketing expertise with his fundraising savvy to effectively craft development campaigns supporting the essential work of Bishop Barron’s evangelization ministry. In his first six months, he helped raise more than $1.2 million and implemented the ministry’s first formal direct mail program that grew to add more than $1.2 million in annual funding. He also instituted new donor-funded campaigns that continue to provide thousands of Word on Fire Bibles to college students and thousands of other materials to marginalized communities around the world.
From 2018-2022, Matt served as senior director of marketing and communications for the University of Saint Mary of the Lake/Mundelein Seminary, one of the largest Catholic seminaries in the United States. He oversaw all of the university’s communications efforts including media relations, website content, social media, email communications, multimedia content, events marketing, and digital advertising. His work attracted thousands of new email subscribers, raised thousands of dollars in online donations, and spread awareness of the seminary’s work to new audiences through social media campaigns and online events.
He has also served as the senior manager of strategic communications for Catholic Extension, a non-profit organization that raises funds for poor Catholic dioceses around the country. His social media campaigns were recognized with “Best in Class” awards from the Associated Church Press and the Religion Communicators Council.
Paolelli earned a bachelor’s degree and a master’s degree in journalism from the Medill School of Journalism. He later worked at Medill as a teaching technologies specialist, where he instructed students and faculty in multimedia software, Web technology and content management systems. He then worked as a Web content producer for Northwestern University Relations, where he produced hundreds of multimedia news features as well as created and managed the University’s social media presence. He also produced a half-hour documentary that aired on the Big Ten Network. See Multimedia Work
As a freelance reporter, Matt wrote extensively for The Daily Herald. As a blogger and columnist, his work has appeared in U.S. Catholic magazine, Medill Magazine, Northwestern Magazine, Motherly, Fatherly, Aleteia, Word on Fire, The Grotto Network, and the Catholic News Service. See Writing Samples
He spent seven years teaching journalism and multimedia reporting as an adjunct professor at Medill and is the proud recipient of the 2014 Medill Students’ Choice award from across all faculty members. He was named to the Associated Student Government Faculty Honor Roll three times.
When he’s not doing any of that, he’s playing board games, teaching himself guitar, or going on adventures with his wife and four kids.
You can connect with him on LinkedIn. He does not actually speak in the third person.