fenton_industryguide_provingyourworth.pdf
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PROVINGYOUR WORTH
10 Ways to Measure the Impact of Your Communications
260 Fith Avenue, 9th Floor, New York, NY 10001 1000 Vermont Avenue, NW, Suite 200, Washington, DC 20005 182 Second Street, Suite 400, San Francisco, CA 9410
NEW YORK WASHINGTON, D.C. SAN FRANCISCO
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In this practical guide, we outline 10 key questionsto help evaluate whether your communications are
eective. Did you:
2009 FENTON Communications. All Rights Reserved2
Those o us who work in communications areoten asked how we measure success and whether
we can show a return on the investment or the
dollars put into media campaigns. Well be the frst
to acknowledge that appraising the results rom
communications work is not as straightorward as
counting the number o people served by a ood bank
or the number o women who walk through the doors
o a prenatal clinic every year. But communications
can be measured in more ways than one.
Success is much more than a book o news clips at
the end o the day. And earned media is just one acet
o a communications program, which can include
everything rom an online presence to advertising and
the strategy work needed or a solid oundation.
Advance your advocacy goals?
Change behavior?
Raise money?
Grow your membership?
Build the skills o your sta?
Build new relationships with inuentials?
Rerame your issue?
Introduce a new word into the lexicon?
Strengthen your organizations position,
brand and power?
And, are you quantiying and qualiying
your results eectively?
This list is by no means exhaustive, but i you can
answer these questions, youll be light years ahead
in articulating the value o communications. Thatsgood news. Because the better case you make or
communications, the more likely your organization
will invest in it and the more good youll be able
to do in the world.
Lisa Witter
Chie Operating Ofcer, FENTON Communications
INTRODUCTION
Proving Your Worth: 10 Ways to Measure the Impact o Your Communications
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1. Advance your advocacy goals.
Moving legislation means pressuring decision-makersto do the right thing. Communications is essential
whether it involves building grass tops alliances or
mobilizing your grassroots base to add ame to the fre.
Case in Point: Protecting the Alaska
Wilderness from Oil Drilling
The heart o the Arctic National Wildlie Reuge in Alaska is its
coastal plain, a 25-mile band o tundra wetlands considered
by many to be a national treasure. The plain is critical
spawning ground or wildlie including caribou and polar
bears. It is also viewed as prime real estate or drilling by the
oil industry.
The Alaska Wilderness League (AWL), the group at the center
o a large environmental coalition, had ought or years
to protect the coastal plain rom pro-drilling members in
Congress. As gas prices spiked ater Hurricane Katrina, so did
pressure to open up the Reuge. For nine months leading
up to a critical vote by Congress, AWL and the coalition
waged an aggressive national media campaign to pressure
policymakers to do the right thing.
With FENTONs help, AWL raised the media prole o the
issue by reaching beyond environmental beat reporters
to D.C.s top political reporters. As the King Kong movie
remake hit the theaters, AWL unleashed a hard-hitting ad,
starring drilling proponent Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) as King
Stevens in a story o oil and money.
Media exposure in The Washington Post, Forbes,
BusinessWeek, Fox News and elsewhere, combined with
lobbying and a grassroots rally on the Capitol, contributed
to a major victory when both houses o Congress voted toprotect the coastal plain rom drilling.
Bonus Tip
Make sure youre involved rom the very beginning with
your policy team so there is a communications strategy
to match the advocacy strategy. When it comes to
maximizing the ull power o communications, getting in
on the ground foor is a must or success.
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With fu season approaching, the American Lung Association
worked with FENTON to kick o a public education
campaign encouraging people to get vaccinated.
As part o the Lung Associations Stick With the Flu Shot
campaign, we helped them conceive o and release a new
study on the number o children hospitalized each year in
emergency rooms because o the fu. B-roll and satellitemedia tours gave our medical spokespeople national
bandwidth, and a new user-riendly eature on the Lung
Associations Web site enabled visitors to type in their zip
code to nd a fu shot dispenser near them.
The campaign reached more than 100 million people
through media outlets including USA Today Weekend,
Parade, Good Housekeeping, and local newspapers and
TV aliates across the country. At its peak, the American
Lung Associations Web site received millions o hits a day.
Bonus Tip
Every behavioral change campaign should be evaluated by
the numbers. Create a benchmark map so you can chart
your beore and ater progress. Share these quantitative
results with your leadership sta and board. These numbers
will help you get budget support or next years campaigns.
Case in Point: Stick With the Flu Shot
2. Change behavior.
True behavioral change, which oten alls under
the purview known as social marketing, is difcult
to come by and even harder to measure or most
organizations. But with a targeted strategy, it can
be done.
Whether its convincing American teenagers not
to binge drink or women in sub-Saharan Arica to
use condoms to prevent HIV/AIDS, success hingeson the right combination o message, messenger
and harnessing the vehicles most likely to reach
your audience.
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Case in Point: Fund the Research, Find a Cure
3. Raise money.
Shaking the money tree involves a lot more than grant
proposals and direct donor appeals. A targeted media
campaign can help you reach a broader pool o new
donors who are inspired to give when they learn about
your work.
In 2004, or the rst time, Caliornians and New Yorkers had the
option o making a donation to prostate cancer research by lling
out a line on their state income tax returns. The Prostate Cancer
Foundation worked with FENTON to help raise unds through the
donation line.
The public outreach and media campaign, Fund the Research, Find
a Cureput ormer Super Bowl champion Roosevelt Rosey Grier
and Tony Award-winning actor and cancer survivor Mandy Patinkin
o Evita and Yentl ame on the talk show circuit.
Coverage included the Wall Street Journal, Newsweek.com,
National Public Radio and an Associated Press story which was
picked up by nearly 70 local newspapers in our target markets.
More than 20,000 New Yorkers donated $224,000, which ballooned
to $672,000 thanks to matches by public and private sources. In
Caliornia, donations totaled $188,000, or a combined coast-to-
coast total o $860,000 or prostate cancer research.
Bonus Tip
Because raising money is so essential or every nonprots
survival, you should be connected at the hip with your
development team. Make sure you have regular meetings soyou can support their important work and identiy opportunities
between undraising and other programs that can be maximized
with communications.
Case in Point: Fund the Research, Find a Cure
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4. Grow your membership/email list.
Membership is the backbone o many nonproftorganizations or both activism and unding.
When the Polly Klaas Foundation undertook its winning
advocacy campaign to create a national Amber Alert
system, a welcome beneft was that the public exposure
helped bee up their income rom new donors and
activists in the orm o 50,000 new members.
Case in Point:
Standing Up to Religious Right Extremism
The Campaign to Deend the Constitution
(www.deconamerica.org) is an online grassroots movement
combating the growing power o the religious right. In just
one year, DeCon grew its membership to 100,000, thanks
to an aggressive communications campaign that combined
traditional media relations and online marketing to drive
member sign-ups.
The group made its mark publicly by taking a strong stance
on issues like stem cell research and the showdown between
evolution and so-called intelligent design in the classroom.
These high-visibility eorts drove people to a dynamic
Web site where they were encouraged to sign up or action
alerts, ollow a blog, join community orums and check out
a requently updated headline news section. These parallel
on- and o-line tactics are keeping old members active and
continuing to attract new ones.
Bonus Tip
Robust e-mail membership lists are an organizations
backbone in todays digital age. Work with your IT stato receive regular reports o your Web activity so you
can connect the dots between increased trac and your
communications activity. These measurements will allow
you to rene and improve your program. Theyre also great
numbers to put in ront o your executive director and board
o directors.
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Only a ew years old, the Social Work Leadership Institute
(SWLI) at the New York Academy o Medicines goal is to
grow the workorce o social workers needed to care or the
population boom o adults over 60.
In a short amount o time, SWLI had launched an ambitious
policy agenda and was unding 41 graduate programs
in social work across the country to oer aging-inusedcurricula. What they didnt have was institutional language
to describe their programs to their target audiences, a
diverse group that included university deans, service
agencies and policymakers.
SWLI worked with FENTON on an in-house style guide
that ormalized and streamlined specic language to
describe each o their programs, the most compelling stats
to put orward, as well as branding guidelines or when and
where to use their suite o graphic logos. The guide is now a
quick, shorthand reerence or all their communications.
Bonus Tip
I youre hiring an outside rm to help with your
communications campaign, leverage your investment by
getting some on-the-ground training rom your consultant
so you build your in-house communications capacity.
Case in Point: On Message, On Point
5. Build skills o your sta.
One o the core principles o eective communications
is uniormity o message, especially in our inormation
overloaded culture. Getting your sta on the same page
with the same message is important hygiene or every
organizations success.
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6. Build new relationships with infuentials.
One o the most eective ways to position your
organization as an authority in your feld is to raise your
profle and inuence among opinion leaders and experts.
Case in Point: On Message, On Point
Few nonprots can claim to have been on The Oprah Winfrey
Show seven times. Women or Women Internationals ounder
Zainab Salbi can. But she also knew she wanted to steer the
organization in a new direction which meant reaching new
audiences.
Salbis goal was to improve Women or Women Internationals
positioning as an authority on global aairs and policy. FENTON
worked with her on a campaign, Stronger Women, Stronger
Nations, that included Capitol Hill briengs on women in post-
Saddam Iraq, an unprecedented survey o 1,000 Iraqi women on
their uture, and a conerence ocused on ensuring the rights o
women in the then-new Iraqi constitution.
Within a year, Women or Women International appeared in a
number o national opinion-leading media outlets, including a
12-minute segment on ABC News Now, NBC Nightly News,
Washington Post, Newsweek, US News & World Report,
and numerous times on CNN and CNN International.The exposure
helped position the organization as an authoritative source or
political reporters and state department ocials and created
a space or women at the grassroots to have a voice in issue
debates that aect their lives.
Case in Point: Getting the Ear of the Right People
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We couldnt have written the above CBS MarketWatch
headline better ourselves.
San Francisco think tank and program incubator Civic
Ventures launched the Purpose Prize, a $100,000 award or
social innovators over 60, as part o its larger mission to tap
the experience o older Americans and inspire millions to
use their experience or the greater good. With Americans
living longer, healthier lives than ever beore, this third age
is an opportunity or social entrepreneurship.
The strategy: get news bounce o trend stories about the
rst wave o baby boomers to hit retirement age. Media
interest was so great, we realized we could get two bites o
the apple: First announce the prize nalists to build buzz,
ollowed up by the announcement o the winners, which
included a armer, a ormer car salesman and the rst black
mayor o Philadelphia.
Stories by NBC Nightly News,CNN, NPR, Time,
Newsweek, the New York Times, Washington Post, WallStreet Journal, Los Angeles Times, and elsewhere helped
create a counter-narrative to the perception that retirement
is strictly a lie o leisure by portraying Americans in mid-lie
as social innovators.
Theres a new phase o lie, between mid-lie and true
old age, Civic Venturesounder Marc Freedman told the
New York Times. The potential or the common good is
staggering.
Case in Point: Older EntrepreneursRewrite Retirement Rules
7. Rerame your issue.
The news media is a key battleground or inuencing
peoples perceptions and belies about an issue, or how
they choose to live their lives. Rewiring how people think
doesnt happen overnight but the right communications
strategy can help push your message through.
Bonus Tip
The rst step to rerame a debate is to research thecurrent rame. Examine how your issue is portrayed in
the news media, pop culture, and the blogosphere. It
may also be critical to audit target audience on how
they perceive the issue. I budget permits, consider ocus
groups and/or polling to help put your nger on current
rames as well as test new ones. Good execution oten
requires good research dont orget to plan or it.
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You dont have to be a an o William Safres weekly
column in the New York Times Magazineto know the
power o coining a new catch phrase or word. Its possibly
the shortest path to getting your message across.
8. Introduce a new word into the lexicon.
Pink teddy bears, makeup, water bottles, watches, blenders,
candles: It must be Breast Cancer Awareness Month.
For the past ew years, Breast Cancer Action (BCA) has made it
its mission to raise a dierent type o awareness in the month o
October: how corporate cause marketing, or pink washing, may
be doing more to push their products than helping women with
breast cancer.
Pink washing is the sister o green washing PR propaganda that
coats polluting companies with a deceptive eco-riendly nish
(think European oil giant BPs $200 million Beyond Petroleum ad
campaign). Except in this case, its corporations wrapping their
products in pink ribbons that is raising questions about where
the money goes, and whether women with breast cancer actually
benet. Most egregious o all are companies whose products (like
cars and certain cosmetics) are linked to incidence o the disease.
Take Yoplait, which says it will donate 10 cents to the Komen
Foundation or every yogurt lid you mail in. To donate $10, youd
have to eat 100 yogurts.
What drives these companies is the bottom line. Theres no
better way to improve prots than to tie your product to a social
cause, and theres no better cause than breast cancer, said BCA
Executive Director Barbara Brenner. Its time or people to take
a closer look, and to think beore they pink. Ater all, i shopping
could cure breast cancer, it would be cured already.
Case in Point: Pink Washing during Breast
Cancer Awareness Month
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9. Strengthen your organizations position,brand and power.
No news is neutral. A good media strategy can help
control how a story is reported and how an organization
is perceived. Shaping perception is especially critical
i an organization is the new kid on the block. Smart
communications can help build your credibility and
brand quickly.
When the Blue Fund, a progressive mutual und, hired FENTON
to help with the public launch o their organization, we knew
that answering the skeptics up ront would be the rst order o
business. I we could prove that a mutual und that screens or
Democratic-leaning companies could outperorm Republican-
leaning ones, the Blue Funds positioning in the marketplace
would be golden.
One week prior to the ocial launch, we helped the Blue Fund
release a white paper to the business press with hard numbers
to show that investing in companies whose top executives
commit the majority o their companys and their own political
action committee (PAC) contributions to the Democratic Party (and
that meet progressive labor and environmental standards) actually
pays o not just politically, but nancially: Over the past ve
years, the Blue Large Cap Index would have beaten the S&P 500
by slightly over 13 percent annually, and beaten companies that
give the bulk o their political contributions to Republicans by over
15 percent.
A story on www.slate.com, Blue is Green, switly became the
online news sites number one orwarded story o the week,
helping drive more than 3,000 unique hits to the Blue Funds Web
site in just one 24-hour period.
Case in Point: Investing in Meaningful Change
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10. Quantiying and qualiying yourresults eectively?
So you got a story in USA Today. How many eyeballs did
you reach? Media results in terms o audience share and
readership can be measured the bean counters at the
TV networks and newspapers do it all the time to entice
advertisers to buy space. The online world has its own
easy-to-track benchmarks.
Measure print impact: The Audit Bureau o
Circulations provides independent, third-partycirculation audits o print circulation, readership
and Web site activity. Some o the inormation
is accessible or ree on their Web site:
www.accessabc.com
Measure broadcast impact: Check the Web site
or the outlet and click on the section targeting
advertisers. There you will oten fnd something
called a media kit which oten includes inormation
about the stations viewers and listeners.
Measure online impact: An array o services can
help you measure success, depending on your goals.
For tracking online news coverage, traditional search
engines like Google and GoogleNews do a great job
o covering online media journals, as well as the Web
sites o mainstream news sources. You can pick up
stories that appear on their online editions but didnt run
in print or broadcast.
Sites such as www.technorati.com and www.blogpulse.com
allow you to track which blogs are covering your issues,
how popular these blogs are, and the traction your issue
is getting within the blogosphere.
For meaningul results tracking activity on your Web site,we recommend that you track how many unique visitors
are accessing your site, where theyre coming rom, and
what percentage are converting (i.e., taking you up on
your call to action).
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To get results, you have to intentionally plan rom the beginning. Below is a grid to help. Not all categories will apply,but this should get you started.
Tool: comprehensive evaluation grid
Planned for pre-campaign Evaluated post-campaign Results
Advocacy Impact
Change Behavior
Raise Money
Grow Membership/
Email List
Reframe
Build Skills
Build Relationships
Lexicon
Brand Power
Quality + Quantity
COMPREHENSIVE EVALUATION GRID
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About FENTON Communications
For more than 25 years, FENTON Communicationshas partnered with nonprofit clients to make
social change. We work to protect the environment,
improve public health and advance human rights
and social justice. This guide is one in a series
that weve produced to help build the strategic
communications capacity of the nonprofit sector.
To download a free copy of this and other FENTON
guides, visit www.fenton.com.
Contact Us
Questions? Comments? We welcome your
thoughts and ideas.
New York
Lisa Witter, Chie Operating Ofcer
(212) 584-5000
Washington, D.C.
Ira Arlook, Managing Director
(202) 822-5200
San Francisco
Parker Blackman, Managing Director
(415) 901-0111