July 2008

 Six Strategies to Get Your Nonprofit Noticed 

By Carla Lazzareschi
Former General Manager, Los Angeles Times Books;   
  Former Los Angeles Times Business Reporter;  Current ESC Consultant

 
Getting good, consistent and reliable public relations as a nonprofit agency has always seemed like something akin to winning the lottery: theoretically possible, but practically (and probably) not in the cards. Does it really have to be such a crapshoot?

Not anymore.

Nonprofit agencies can take greater control of their public relations destiny by relying more heavily on the Internet and what are being termed its “Web 2.0 strategies” that are based on social networking, viral communications and citizen journalism. Not only do electronic communications cost less money and take less time than traditional ink-on-paper media kits, press release mailings, follow-up phone calling and finger-crossing hoping and praying, they allow you to reach more people more quickly and generate more feedback and conversation within your audience. A key goal of this new style of communication is to build community and encourage a yeasty and vibrant participation within it to build loyalty to your mission and activities.

Where do you begin?

Get an Intern.
University students are not just an inexpensive source of talent; they are, much more importantly, a great source of technological know-how.

Who else grew up with video games and cell phones and has spent as many hours on YouTube, MySpace or Facebook? Today’s college students are technologically savvy and, I’m willing to bet, much closer to the cutting edge of communications than virtually anyone on your staff today.

The University of Southern California’s Annenberg School of Communications offers both undergraduate and graduate degrees in public relations, and its students are available for internships.  You can list your openings on the school’s website by writing to Tim Burgess, the school’s career development director, at tburgess@usc.edu. 

The Los Angeles chapter of the Public Relations Society of America also accepts postings for student internship opportunities; for more information, go to www.prsa-la.org.

But, cautions Tisha Dore, a freelance public relations consultant in San Diego, choose your intern very carefully. You want a smart and hard working student, not someone just marking time in your office.

Scrutinize your website.
Are you making the most of it? Is it up to date and refreshed regularly (which means at the very least three times a week)? Do you offer links to other agencies that are like-minded or do similar work? Does anyone else link to you? (Links are a good thing; you should collect them like baseball cards.) Does anyone from your staff, Board or stakeholder group write a regular blog on your website about issues that matter to your agency, community, and/or cause? Blogs are a great way to initiate and maintain a dialog between your agency and the wider community. Use them to solicit opinions, open conversations and spread the word about your mission and activities.

Do your website and blogs routinely ask for feedback? Soliciting responses is a wonderful way to create a relationship with your audience. Next, acquaint yourself with the new bookmarking technology, such as del.icio.us, which allows visitors to keep track of your site easily and share it contents with friends. The service is free.

Explore the world of social networking.
Facebook, MySpace and YouTube aren’t just for kids anymore. These sites can help you build a community for your mission and publicize your cause. Why shouldn’t you post video of your event on the web—especially when you went all out to land that celebrity emcee for your live auction?

Become a citizen journalist.
You can post your “news” and comments on sites such as newsvine and get the word out without relying on intermediaries. This is hardly a foolproof step and it essentially relies on the wisdom of crowds to mediate the distance between truth and fiction, but if you’ve already written your press release, there’s no point in not posting it on one of these sites.

By the way, the PR Newswire, routinely used by for-profit businesses, offers discounts and special assistance to non-profit agencies.  

Create your own Wikipedia page.
Control the results of a Google search of your name or mission in your local geography.  When a web user googles you, let the first results be your website and your Wikipedia page. Wikipedia is a user-created encyclopedia and free and open to all. Why not use it?
           

Begin collecting e-mail addresses from your stakeholders. “Collecting e-mail addresses is key to future communications,” says Jeff Wilcox, president and chief executive officer of Executive Consulting for the Nonprofit Sector Inc. in Long Beach.

Requests for e-mail addresses must appear on every printed piece you circulate and at every event where you collect sign-ins. Don’t be afraid to ask your stakeholders for this information; everyone is used to it by now.

E-mail addresses are just as important (and perhaps more so) as street addresses. Once you get the information, be sure to keep your database up to date. An electronic communications strategy relies heavily on your e-mail list; one that is short or riddled with out-of-date addresses isn’t much help.

So when special events committees begin compiling their invitation list, add a column for e-mail addresses to the task. That will be a gift that keeps on giving.  

*  *  *  *  *

Carla Lazzareschi is a retired journalist who spent 20 years at the Los Angeles Times. During her last eight years there, she served as general manager of LA Times Books, the paper’s book publishing division. She welcomes your comments and questions about this article and can be reached at exec1@escsc.org.

Many thanks to Jeff Wilcox, Tisha Dore, Didi D’errico, a public relations executive from Walnut Creek, and Mina Manchester, a public relations consultant in the San Francisco office of Blanc & Otus, for sharing their expertise with ESC.