This is the presentation I put together for my capstone project. I hope you will enjoy it. Please contact me with questions or if you need assistance in public relations for your nonprofit.

1. PUBLIC RELATIONS FOR NONPROFITS
Navigating you through the noise.
Andrea J. Sok

2. WHY IS THIS A CRITICAL ISSUE?
Competition for funding, volunteers and donors.

How do you make your message the one that is heard?
Technology has a virtual shrinking effect on the world. The public is

bombarded with images, causes, and requests for support form
organizations in Asia, Africa, and their hometown.
How do you put your mission in front of the decision makers?
Accountability, Transparency and trust are demanded by the

public.
How do you bolster your credibility and garner the public’s trust?
“Employ the right PR to beat the competition, fight for your share of
voice and go all out to make a personal connection with your target
audience.”
Art Feinglass, The Public Realtions Handbook for Nonprofits

3. Public Relations can help nonprofits “Effective PR is
achieve their mission in three ways.
essential to
raising
Generate Awareness

money, attracting
members, energi
Enhance Fundraising

zing
Help survive a crisis
 supporters, and
fulfilling the
organization’s
mission.”
Art Feinglass

4. GENERATE AWARENESS
“Lack of visibility in the media is not due to any
shortage of great stories to tell but, as for many other
nonprofits, to a lack of focus on public relations.”
Art Feinglass

5. HOUSING VIRGINIA CAMPAIGN 2003
Objectives PR Plan
Create awareness for Housing Virginia and the Identify target audiences
 
affordable housing issue among 30% of
Put a “face” on affordable housing by

Charlottesville area residents.
illustrating the need among elderly and
municipal workers
Decrease the percentage of Charlottesville

Design and launch a revised tag line and

area residents who believe affordable housing
logo
only refers to individuals on welfare by 5%.
Advertise key message in radio and print

Also deliver key messages at grass roots

Increase the percentage of Charlottesville area

level through print collateral.
residents who believe that municipal
employees and the elderly are individuals who Develop full service website with easy

need affordable housing by 5%. access to information.

6. THE RESULTS
48% of area residents were aware of Housing Virginia and the affordable housing issue.

18% fewer residents believed affordable housing was only for families living on welfare.

9% more residents believed municipal workers and the elderly were among those needing affordable

housing.
Other: City of Charlottesville adopted a housing strategy that created additional affordable housing.
The state legislature began considering a plan that would require a portion for affordable housing out
of all new housing developments in the Charlottesville area.
The success of the campaign also afforded Housing Virginia the ability to expand to serve the
Northern Virginia and Virginia Beach areas
Total Budget: $150,000

7. ENHANCE FUNDRAISING
Campaign Support
Event Attendance
Cause Marketing

8. SAN DIEGO RESCUE MISSION
Objectives PR Plan
Develop and repeat key messages
Increase total donations by 25%. 

Capitalized upon the community’s

Generate four times the previous

interest in philanthropy during the
media coverage as the year
holiday season to generate
before.
publicity for the Mission’s work.
Engage at least six high profile

Create two high profile events to

advocates for the Mission to help
engage the media and generate
with continued fundraising.
awareness.
Increase corporate contributions

Media training for staff

by 25%.

9. THE RESULTS
Increased donations by 118%.

Generated five times the previous media coverage.

Enlisted 17 high profile individuals to assist with the campaign.

Increased overall corporate donations by 65%.

Total budget of $0
($5,000/month to retain Public Relations firm)

10. SURVIVE CRISIS
“Our overall goal is to be sure a line of communication is
established at the time of the crisis and continues throughout;
including follow-up efforts that outline what is being done to
solve problems and make sure they do not occur again,” Cary
Pfeffer, ClearComm Communications.

11. UNITED WAY OF LANSING, MICHIGAN 2002
Objectives PR Plan
Limit the loss of donations to better Media training for spokespersons
 
than 20-50% declines (benchmark Multiple news conferences

set by other United Ways in similar
Meetings with local media

circumstances).
Daily media briefings and updates

Limit the loss of the number of

Public service announcements

donors who contribute.

12. THE RESULTS
Annual raised $6.32 million toward their $6.95 million goal

Donor base remained stable at 3000

Total Budget: $48,000

13. RECOMMENDATIONS
PR Plan
Crisis Management Plan
Measure Your Success

14. Public Relations Plan “The most
frequent
mistake that
What are we trying to accomplish?

nonprofits
What are the short term and long term goals that

make when
need to be met?
reaching out to
Who is our target audience, and how can we reach

the media is
them?
not having a
What are the time parameters?

plan in place
Who will do what? first.”

What results do we want?

What are the key messages we want to relay?

Lagasse
How will we measure results?


15. Crisis Management Plan
“This was a crime
against the
Identify and continually relay key messages.

community. We will
Appoint and train a spokesperson(s).
 prosecute those
responsible to the
Train employees how to respond to a crisis.

fullest extent of the
Provide a constant stream of information.

law, relentlessly
Tell the media only what you know.
 pursue recovery of
the stolen
Form good relationships with the media before a

funds, and
crisis.
implement
safeguards to
protect community
funds.”
Lansing United Way

16. MEASURE YOUR SUCCESS
Develop benchmarks
o
Use focus groups
o
Surveys
o
Keep a Clip Book
o
Use a media value system
o
Advertising Equivalency
o
Media Impression
o

17. CONCLUSION
“PR for nonprofits is an ongoing process of telling the
organization’s story, conveying its message, establishing its
identity, and maintaining its image in the hearts and minds of
the public.”
Art Feinglass
Invest in Public Relations
to
Navigate through the noise