Nonprofit Communications

Last week, guest blogger Claire “Voyant” Meyerhoff explained how she was going to use the Triple Ps (Precise Perfect Placement) to get some media coverage for one of her pro-bono clients, the Ronald McDonald House of Durham, NC. Claire sent me another update yesterday.

Here she is on Mother’s Day, with volunteer stylist Natasha Bieber and Amanda Lockyer of Welcome, North Carolina. Lockyer and her husband and son are staying at the Ronald McDonald House while their infant daughter, Gracie Jean, is in the NICU at Duke. Nine-week-old Gracie Jean was born with an abnormally small heart and needs a transplant.

The Raleigh News and Observer’s Ruth Sheehan did a lovely column titled “Mothers’ Tribute a Cut Above” on May 5, the Monday before Mother’s Day. Claire hoped an N&O photographer would show up at Ronald McDonald House on Mother’s Day, but the assignment manager said there weren’t enough photographers to cover everything. However, he was very helpful in giving Claire information on how to get photos to him to be placed in the paper and their website.

With less than 24-hours notice, Claire contacted her friend, Dave Horne, a professional photographer (www.davehornephotography.com). Dave saved the day, taking more than 100 photographs free of charge and offering them free and clear.

In her next guest blog post, Claire will talk about how she used those photos.

The moral of this PR story so far: When the assignment editor hands you lemons, keep asking questions. He may give you the recipe for lemonade.

By Guest Blogger Claire “Voyant” Meyerhoff

On Monday, I gave you my new acronym for getting press coverage — the Triple Ps: Precise Perfect Placement. I explained how I was going to put it to the test this week for a Mother’s Day event.

So here’s my casual Friday update. Like I said, I did a very precise pitch to get my pro-bono nonprofit client some publicity. I made a couple of phone calls and sent an email.

First, the event:

My hairstylist Janice and I are going to the Ronald McDonald House of Durham on Mother’s Day. Janice is going to cut hair for the moms who have more on their minds than their hair. They’re far from home, caring for a seriously ill child.

Janice and I did this last year and it was a big hit. It all started when we learned (while she was doing my hair) that we both dislike Mother’s Day because our moms are gone (as in deceased).

My goal this year is to get some QUALITY coverage for the Ronald McDonald House of Durham. I called the Raleigh News and Observer and followed up with an email. Granted, I spoke to the Executive Editor, who is an old acquaintance, and he offered to pass along the info the weekend editor. Still, a good story is a good story. I’m hoping they send a photographer to take some nice photos of the Moms — and that these photos will be in their print edition and on their website.

I made one other phone call — this one to N&O columnist Ruth Sheehan. Now, while the House is in Durham, we hope to expand our donor base in Raleigh, since there is no Ronald McDonald House there. So the N&O is a natural choice. I read Ruth’s column all the time and thought she might like this story.

The key words here are: I THOUGHT SHE MIGHT LIKE THE STORY.

Not — I want her to do the story, or she SHOULD do the story, just . . . hey, she might like this . . . it might be right up her alley. I’m familiar with THE TYPE OF STORY Ruth covers and realize she is always on the lookout for good stories. I know my story is a good story, because when I tell people about Janice cutting hair for the Mom’s, people say, “wow, that’s really great!”

A few days later, Ruth called. We set up a time to meet for coffee. We had a lovely chat and I gave her Janice’s phone number.

A few days later, this is what turned up in the Raleigh News and Observer.

I think the Triple P’s are working, don’t you?

By Guest Blogger Claire “Voyant” Meyerhoff

Fanfare please.

“Ladies and Gentleman, Claire Meyerhoff and Nonprofit Marketing Guide present a new acronym . . .”

PPP

The Three P’s of Pitching will help your nonprofit get better coverage! It will solve all your public relations problems! It will build strong bones twelve different ways! Nine out of ten doctors recommend it!

Or maybe the Three P’s will simply give you a new way of looking at taming that beast called “Media Coverage.” I will now reveal the words behind our acronym . . .

3P’s of Pitching

• Precise
• Perfect
• Placement

If you’re the lucky gal or guy in charge of “getting coverage” for your organization, maybe this is your strategy: You write a press release, send it to every news outlet in town, then make follow up calls. Then you’re disappointed when you don’t get coverage. And it really is a good story.

Some media consultant types do the “blanket pitch.” They contact every single reporter they know, or don’t know, and pitch the same story to everyone. They blanket the city with press releases, jamming the e-mail boxes of every assignment editor, reporter, associate producer, desk assistant and newsroom secretary in the market. Even the guy who services the vending machine at Action News 15 gets the e-mail, “Nonprofit Announces Boring Survey.”

Not me. I do a very targeted pitch. Precise Perfect Placement.

Since Kivi likes exciting experiments, I’m going to bring one to her Laboratory . . .

I’m in charge of a certain nonprofit’s small event on Mother’s Day, May 11, 2008. My entire media strategy includes two phone calls, one e-mail and then some follow-up phone calls.

Next Monday, May 12th, I’ll let you know how it went.

Hopefully, I’ll have good news (and my client will have made news).

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Want more of Claire’s advice? You can listen to her teleseminar with Kivi earlier this year called “Getting Reporters to Cover Your Nonprofit” for free! Get the mp3 link now.

By Guest Blogger Claire “Voyant” Meyerhoff

In the old days, before the Internet and even fax machines, the Press Release (aka News Release) was Queen of P.R. All over the country, Newsroom Assistants earning $4/hour sorted mail, opened envelopes, unfolded press releases and stacked them in neat piles. For many of these bottom-of-the-totem polers, it was their first real taste of “the power to decide what is news.”

“Hmmm, Senator Charles Grassley is spearheading an effort to make July ‘National Corn Month.’ I’ll put that in the ‘boring government stuff’ stack,” thought Debbie Duespayer, a Desk Assistant in a broadcast newsroom, circa 1984.

“Oh, Mothers Against Drunk Driving is holding an event where they’re going to get a local celebrity intoxicated and do their blood alcohol level on the spot. I’ll put that in the ‘my producer might like this’ stack,” thought Debbie, as she looked at her watch and noticed it was 2:00 a.m. “I leave here in two hours; I hope my VCR recorded Cheers,” she thought. (Note: Never forget that your news release may be read by a person making even less money and working worse hours than you. And you work for a nonprofit . . . so that says something.)

This is what used to happen to press releases. They were put into piles, then the chosen ones were plucked out and put into the “Future File.” Then, the day before, an assignment editor would pull the Future File for the next day and look at all the press releases to see if there was anything worth covering. The rest were chucked in the bin.

My former boss at all-news WTOP, Holland Cooke, even wrote a book called “How to Keep Your Press Release out of the Trash Basket.” Something like that. I would call him to get the exact title, but he’s in Vegas right now attending the “Media Consultants Rule the World But Have to Travel 350 Days a Year to Do It Expo” and I don’t want to bother him.

Out of the trash basket and back to this blog . . .

Obviously, from the senders point of view, it was very important to have a good press release that had the four C’s — CATCHY, CLEAR, CONCISE, and CORRECT — in order to keep it out of the trash basket. Putting all the “go to” information right up top helped, too. I can’t tell you how many times Debbie Duespayer got ticked off because there was no location listed for an “Urgent Press Conference.”

That was then . . . this is now. The Internet has changed things. Debbie Duespayer is now Destiny Duespayer. She’s still working the overnight shift, but she’s reading e-mails pitches instead of opening envelopes.

That’s what we’ll talk about this week during the webinar Kivi and I are doing on Thursday called “How to Write a Press Release Reporters Will Love.” Be there. Or beware: Destiny may delete your e-release.

By Guest Blogger Claire Voyant

If you’re a later baby boomer, maybe you remember “The Archies” singing their animated hearts out during the Saturday morning cartoons.

“Sugar, Sugar . . . ah, honey, honey. You are my candy girl . . . ”

Now that you’re a grown-up, working in the wonderful world of nonprofits, you may be singing that song quite a bit. Only it’s this version:

“Sugar, Sugar . . . ah, MONEY MONEY.”

That’s ironic, isn’t it? The very term, “non-profit” conjures up an image of NO MONEY, little money, or at least, not thinking about turning a profit. What’s that old saying, “Money is the root of all evil?”

But the joke is, “The LACK of money is the root of all evil” – and we know, the lack of money is no laughing matter when you’re trying to run a nonprofit. Money really matters. Every penny, every nickel, every thin dime must be spent wisely.

In Kivi’s survey of upcoming webinars (do it now if you haven’t already), one topic focuses on getting the most out of your communications consultant. When I saw this, I wanted to grab my tambourine and sing, “ . . . you are my candy girl!”

Spread the word, Kivi, and help save those dimes. I know that one message will be, “quantity does not equal quality” and another will be “learn how to identify billable busywork.”

Spreading your message is extremely important, and it doesn’t have to break the bank if you know what you need – and what you don’t. You may only need a sprinkle of sugar and a dab of honey to sweeten your communications. The more you know about the sugar and the honey – the more you’ll get out off your candy girl (or guy.)

By Guest Blogger Claire Voyant

Storytelling. As marketing and PR professionals, we know storytelling works, but sometimes it’s hard to convey that to our clients (you nonprofits out there). After all, our clients are serious people doing serious work. Just the word sounds a little “light” doesn’t it? Storytelling. Like a group of children sitting around granny, quilt on her lap, eyeglasses perched on the tip of her nose.

But . . . that’s just the point! I can SEE granny, spinning her tale, the small children listening, “…and then the mama bear . . .” Now, instead of telling you about granny, what if I said this:

“Every year, the Elder Helper program sends more than 250 senior citizens to over 50 low-income child care centers to read to at-risk youth.” Yes, we have the number. We have the buzz words. What we don’t have is a picture in our head.

Painting a Picture. That is the whole point of WHY storytelling works. But don’t listen to me — listen to the expert. His name is Donald Davis, and he’s one of the most beloved storytellers in the country. Fans pack the house when Donald is in town and he’s the headliner at all the major storytelling festivals from Pigeon Forge, Tennessee to Mariposa, California. This former Methodist minister also works with corporations and nonprofits who want to learn how to turn stories into action.

I called his home in Ocracoke, North Carolina, and first had a nice chat with his lovely wife, Merle Davis. She works with nonprofits, too, and said nonprofits really should tell their stories — because they have the best stories to tell. Then I got to talk with the Donald himself, who told me, “I’m not online . . . I’m on the road!”

I got right to the point and asked him why EXACTLY do stories work.

“Because stories paint a picture in your head,” said Donald. “You don’t HEAR a story — you SEE it. Then you feel what that person is feeling. Then you make the human connection to what they’re saying.”

I see that. In my head.

Then I asked him why EXACTLY numbers and jargon don’t work.

“Because numbers and jargon do not paint a picture. They don’t mean anything to the listener. If I say to you “capacity building” you can’t see it. What does “capacity building” look like?”

I don’t know what “capacity building” looks like. Does it have windows?

There you have it, from the Ocracoke-dwelling, bow-tie wearing, crowd pleasing, tale-spinning story man himself. Stories paint a picture in your head and make you feel. You want your audience to feel your mission, don’t you? So paint a picture — with a story.

From now on, when I want to tell a client why storytelling works, I’m going to tell them a story . . . about Donald Davis.

Claire Voyant is Claire Meyerhoff, a media and communications consultant based in Raleigh, NC. You can contact Claire at meymedia AT aol.com.

This post is part of Kivi’s participation in the Blogging4Learning Challenge, where she is writing various kinds of blog posts (including publishing a guest blogger) to share what she’s learning about storytelling for nonprofits.

Please welcome Claire Voyant — a new guest blogger here at Nonprofit Communications. Claire (whose last name is actually Meyerhoff) sees things others don’t! You’ll be able to find all of Claire’s posts in a new category on this blog called Claire Voyant.

~ Kivi

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By Guest Blogger Claire Voyant

Here I am, Claire Voyant, . . . and I see a trend, people! Actually, it’s Kivi who sees things clearly by highlighting the Humane Society’s spin on the meat mess. By focusing on kids, not cows, the Humane Society got great publicity for their organization.

This is a twist on what I like to call “tag-along” publicity – hitching your nonprofit to someone else’s wagon. When I worked for the National Safe Kids Campaign in D.C, we wanted to publicize accidental poisonings. Sure, we did press releases and fact sheets. No coverage. Then a policy person mentioned that D.C.’s “Mr. Yuck,” based at Georgetown Hospital, was about to lose it’s funding – and it’s home.

With just a few phone calls, I learned the details about their money troubles, rounded up a local family that had a good outcome because of a call to Mr. Yuck, and a TV reporter interested in the story. The next evening, the story, including an interview with a Safe Kids expert, led the local ABC’s 11pm newscast.

We also wrote an editorial that landed in the Washington Post that we got some more coverage. Eventually, the National Capitol Poison Center found a new home and affiliation with George Washington University Hospital.

If you think your organization’s mission is a story in itself (“but we do such great work!”), think again. Unless you’re making news, find some news that you can “tag-along,” team-up, and pitch your story that way.