Volunteer Recruitment Strategies - working with media to get your story told


Here are some tips that will help when you are conducting public relations and marketing for your organization during the volunteer recruitment campaign. These are strategies that I learned in a training meeting aimed at educating volunteers to do PR for one of the 2004 Illinois Senate election candidates. If they work for them, they should work for your tutor/mentor program. Good Luck!

Marketing and Message Delivery
What is the purpose of this campaign? Ok, so this may seem obvious, however answering this question should help with a more direct marketing strategy.

·     What demographic have we been attracting in past campaigns?

·     Have we been satisfied with the caliber of volunteers that we have gotten?

·     What were the characteristics of our best, most sustainable volunteers? Although it is possible for that answer will vary from program to program, I think it is worth asking as we all set similar criteria for what a good volunteer is (eg. Shows dedication to the individual student); therefore it is highly probable that we will be able to draw up some similarities.

·     Once we have targeted who have been the “best” volunteers, (for argument sake, lets say “young, single professionals”) then, how can we shape our message to cater to them? This question moves into the topic of message templates.

 

Message templates- The Right Message shapes your campaign result
The example that the trainers used was that of the Democratic State Senate race. ALL the candidates had relatively similar platforms. The challenge, then for Obama’s PR people was to present what made him different. This directly parallels our situation. LOTS of NGO’s will be seeking volunteers. We ALL have good causes. However, we need to make our cause seem to be the most rewarding. We need to set ourselves (tutoring and mentoring) apart by promoting how being a tutor/mentor will be more beneficial.

 

·     Having said that, I think we need to promote tutoring and mentoring as a two way street. There is a good chance that our volunteers are busy people with many personal concerns.

·     Let’s show them how they can gain. For example, a mentor can gain emotionally, socially, and even professionally- Self Interest is “Hot Button”, so push it!

·     Tutoring and Mentoring is a great way to meet peers who have the same values that you do.

·     Mentoring is an opportunity to directly shape America’s tomorrow.

·     Tutoring and Mentoring help you to develop communication and interpersonal skills that are great assets to any professional environment.

·     Tutoring/Mentoring is your direct contribution to the call for a more socially responsible corporate America!

·     Giving your time to impact your society will set you apart from your colleagues and boost your company’s reputation!

·     Promote the fact that your programs does a good job of supporting volunteers and is well-organized. As a volunteer, I know I love that about a program.

·     With the right support, tutoring/mentoring is a lot easier that most people would have imagined.

Press and Media Relations
The information I drew from this session may be mostly relevant to those organizations taking the lead in their area for the Recruitment Campaign. A lot of the strategies can be used not only with media contact, but also when contacting the other organizations in your area that we want to get involved.

Media Advisories
What media is most likely to get to our target demographic? If we came to the conclusion, that Yes, our best volunteers were young, unmarried professionals…then, for example, we may want to contact the DREX IN THE MORNING show( he is not the classiest DJ, but he plays a varied mix of music , and therefore, will attract an array of listeners on their way to work)

 

Communication with the Media (and potential recruitment partners) These are the tips the pros recommended for when we are making such contacts.

·        Send a one page advisory in 14-point font.

·        Use the Inverted Pyramid Style (Example: Appendix A)

·        First line should hold the most important part of your message and be no longer than 15 words

·        One page max

·        Always have a “fact sheet” (Example: Appendix B) for those who want to know a little more, and be prepared to fax it over.

·        Call to see if release was received then “pitch it”. ASK, “Do you have a minute for a pitch?”

·        Have short pitch lines typed up

·        If dealing with a news reporter
· Call in the morning as we have to consider their deadlines
·  Notice which reporters cover education and community. Give him/her a short pitch on the goals of the campaign and give a lead on the next recruitment meeting and what is going to happen there. They may actually be able to make it to a meeting and may follow the campaign and do a little story on the entire recruitment campaign itself….we never know!

Are we having a press conference?

·     If so….this strategy could be used to invite reporters

·     If they don’t show…call them after the conference and offer to “make it easier for them” / “accommodate their schedules” by getting the info from the conference to them anyway… via fax, or an over the phone interview with a recruiter...etc.

This presentation was developed in August 2004 by Christina Noble, a volunteer with the Tutor/Mentor Connection.