Since February I've been interning in the comms department of a national charity and it's really opened my eyes to a different kind of communication. Creating awareness about a devastating and often fatal disease without resorting to scare tactics can be tricky to say the least. It's a serious matter but does that mean that the communication methods need to be all didactic and no engagement?
During my post-grad studies in PR, a lot of the main focus in textbooks and case studies was on corporations and communications of a consumer nature. Granted there was one course dedicated to fundraising but in terms of PR on a non-profit level, I distinctly remember the phrase being thrown about, "There's little or no money to be made in non-profit PR work...but it's "rewarding"...if you're into that sort of thing."
It's true that chances are that if you work for a charity in their PR department, unless its a biggie (i.e. Oxfam or Unicef), you won't have a huge budget and vast amount of resources at hand. And that's where creativity, insightfulness and social media can work wonders.
A great example of a small charity using digital communications to its full potential is Beatbullying, even their motto echoes the reasoning behind every PR initiative: "Shaping attitudes, changing behaviours."
As big charities are seen as 'wasteful' in the public eye and smaller charities are gaining much needed financial support from a substantial 40 percent of the public, Beatbullying is definitely doing something right.
Media Trust highlighted Sherry Adhami's success with Beatbullying in one of their spring conferences entitled: "What are the ingredients for a successful charity story?"
In addition to providing lesson plans to school to educate children on the dangers of bullying, they also use a potent mix of:
- their own social networking site for peer mentoring (Cybermentors)
- iTunes page offering original music written and produced by children in their BBMusic programme (over 5,000 downloads to date)
- an online learning resource for primary school children partnered up with Shaun the Sheep
- and of course YouTube, Twitter and Facebook
Sherry's impressive efforts have not gone unnoticed and Beatbullying won the 2009 Best Use of Digital Media award at the Third Sector Excellence awards.
There is so much potential in increasing a charity's message to as wide an audience as possible and to make the public more aware and socially conscious but only if charities are willing to embrace new media and its opportunities.
If charities and established corporations have one thing in common, it could be the fear of digital communications. Many charities have been around for a long time and are resistant to drastic or risky change because of the uncertain nature of financial support. It can be hard to convince a charity's CEO or trustees that social media is the way to go.
