Brands regularly use PR to boost brand awareness, generate third-party validation, and find new customers, but PR isn’t just for brands. Learn how you could be leveraging nonprofit PR to generate organizational awareness, boost your SEO, and reach new donors.
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Why Nonprofit PR Is So Important
As a nonprofit marketer, your time and resources are limited. Between direct mailings, donor thank yous, regular newsletters and social media postings, blogs, and special events, your time is already stretched thin but by discounting PR, you’re leaving new leads, valuable prospects, and, ultimately, money on the table. PR is about more than generating awareness. In addition to exposing your organization to potential new donors, a solid nonprofit PR strategy can:
- Generate valuable third-party validation
- Create searchable content online
- Provide high-quality backlinks to boost your website’s SEO
- Drive traffic to your website for further engagement
Need more convincing? Read about the hidden value of PR coverage and why PR is important for every organization.
Nonprofit PR Strategy #1: Make a Plan
Nobody likes to miss the perfect opportunity because they let a key date or deadline go by. Create an editorial calendar to keep track of upcoming events and initiatives, relevant seasons and holidays, and approaching deadlines from media outlets. Larger publications often publish their editorial calendars online and although they are designed to attract lucrative advertisers, these handy calendars also give nonprofit PR professionals the inside scoop on editorial opportunities for pitching a relevant initiative as a story angle or a staff member as a thought leader.
The world of nonprofit PR and digital marketing is always changing, check out our top PR and digital marketing predictions for 2023.
Nonprofit PR Strategy #2: Form a Relationship
Fund development is all about building relationships, right? The same is true for nonprofit PR. Take the time to make connections with the editors, staff writers, and freelancers writing about topics relevant to your organization. Do you work for a nonprofit focused on protecting our outdoor spaces? Find the people covering topics like environmental issues, outdoor recreation, and Leave No Trace ethics and consider shooting them an introductory email or following them on social media.
Before you reach out, make sure you’ve done your homework. Nobody likes receiving generic, mass-produced emails. Don’t pitch a freelancer a story about a land use initiative out east if they only cover renewable energy initiatives out west. Likewise, don’t pitch an editor a story about a tree planting happening next week, if their print publication plans stories months in advance. Sending a pitch tailored to their audience and needs is the quickest way to fall into a writer’s good graces and build strong relationships.
PR efforts are time-consuming and often not within a scrappy nonprofit’s bandwidth, but the right PR partner can earn a small organization a big piece of coverage thanks to years spent fostering critical connections.
Nonprofit PR Strategy #3: Use Existing Content
Wondering where to begin with crafting story ideas or an impactful pitch? You don’t have to start from scratch. Use the resources already at your disposal by turning owned media into earned media. For example, a well-curated blog full of informative how-to articles and insightful first-person narratives can be a valuable pitching tool resource. We’ve found that sharing relevant posts with select media partners can serve as a framework for an article and sometimes leads to a repost of the original blog, greatly increasing its reach.
When it comes to pitching not all blog posts are created equal. Consider sharing posts that inform, engage, and excite, while avoiding posts with overly branded language. For example, we shared a client’s blog post about BPA found in sports bras with select media partners. In return, the brand received coverage in an outlet with an estimated 1.8 million monthly visitors.
Feeling inspired? Check out the rest of our out-of-the-box pitching strategies for generating impactful coverage.
Nonprofit PR Strategy #4: Act Like a Local
Thinking local doesn’t mean thinking small. In fact, according to a 2019 survey, 73% of Americans follow local news at least somewhat closely, 89% get at least some local news digitally, and 41% get at least some local news digitally often. Unless you work for a large national nonprofit, chances are your most likely donors and volunteers are right in your own backyard. Take advantage of your local media—whether it’s print, online, TV, or radio—and reach your target audience where they consume news.
In 2022, Darby Communications helped the French Broad River Partnership amplify its Economic Impact and Environmental Value Study. Over the span of a few short months, we distilled the dense report into easily digestible formats that captured the attention of journalists, policymakers, and community members alike. A local media push resulted in a dozen meaningful press hits with an estimated reach of four billion, including a front-page feature in the region’s principal newspaper.
Read more about our work with the French Broad River Partnership and how we turned data into visuals, leveraged impactful stakeholder testimonials, and prioritized local media outreach to increase reach and engagement.
Nonprofit PR Strategy #5: Use the Right Message
When pitching, make sure you’re matching the right audience with the right message. In the world of nonprofit PR, we call this framing, or setting an issue within a particular context or emphasizing particular attributes of an issue in order to achieve a desired interpretation or perspective. How you ‘frame’ an issue in turn influences how your audience perceives that issue.
For example, one of Darby Communication’s long-time clients, Appalachian Gear Company, makes performance garments and gear made of 100% natural fibers. However, rather than merely framing the purchase of an alpaca garment as good for the environment, we also framed it as good for the audience’s health (by reducing the number of microplastics that humans can inhale or ingest) and also good for their wallets (by purchasing a garment that will last for years without needing repair).
Read more about our work with Appalachian Gear Company and how we implemented an omnichannel campaign that resulted in a 400% increase in website traffic and a 900% increase in direct-to-consumer sales over the previous month.
Nonprofit PR Tactic #6: Monitor the ROI
You’re probably already monitoring the impact of your nonprofit’s donor mailings, email marketing, and/or social efforts. So why wouldn’t you monitor the impact of your nonprofit PR? We’ll be the first to admit that measuring the impact of some of nonprofit PR’s many benefits is tricky, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible. Consider using tools like Similarweb and Google Analytics to track metrics like unique visitors per month, pageview, new users, users, sessions, and bounce rate.
Need a quick Google Analytics crash course? Check out our top 5 tips for navigating Google Analytics reports.
Nonprofit PR Tactic #7: Getting Mileage Out of It
Marketers, especially nonprofit marketers, often wear many hats. While that usually means a lot of work, it also means easy connectivity. Don’t think of your nonprofit PR and digital marketing efforts as separate; think of them as complementary, with one informing the other. That awesome PR coverage you received is great to share with your donors through direct mailings, regular newsletters, or social media!
Your nonprofit PR efforts shouldn’t stop once you’ve secured a press hit. Check out the rest of our tips for maximizing your PR coverage.
Our Nonprofit Marketing Services
The Darby Comm team has years of success with nonprofits of all sizes and all manner of budgets, timelines, and needs. To learn how we can help YOUR nonprofit garner impactful media coverage, enhance your social media or email marketing strategy, polish your public-facing copy, or otherwise engage your stakeholders, drop us a line HERE. You can also learn more about our nonprofit services and successes HERE.