NEW COMMUNICATION STRATEGIES FOR FOUNDATIONS AND NON-PROFITS

By Herb Rubenstein, President
Marc Chimes, Director of Communications
Herb Rubenstein Consulting

Introduction

The time has arrived when necessity dictates that foundations and non-profits communicate with more effectiveness to a broader set of target audiences. The very public public relations meltdown that the Red Cross suffered in the wake of the September 11th tragedy should make every non-profit organization and every foundation stop and think: “How can my organization be prepared for that kind of public scrutiny in this age of instant communication among millions of people?”

This article focuses primarily on the needs of foundations and non-profits to get the word out about their primary mission. It is intended to help you review how your foundation or non-profit organization communicates with its major stakeholders, how it can make the foundation’s grants award process more transparent, how the foundation can track the results of its grants to leverage their effectiveness, and how a foundation can better publicize the full magnitude of its contributions to society. With the tax exempt status of foundations being seriously questioned, and with foundations responding to this threat by looking for ways to attract higher quality and higher impact proposals from potential grantees, the need has never been greater for philanthropic organizations to get their message out to as broad an audience as possible. Additionally, with rapid economic growth fueling an enormous increase in venture philanthropy over the past twenty years and the next twenty years, foundations are currently finding it harder and harder, and it will become harder still, to distinguish themselves and generate a strong, clear, distinctive identity to the community at large.

The strategies listed below utilize state of the art tools deployed by the largest public relations firms. These strategies can be adapted by foundations, using limited budget resources, either through outsourcing the communications function to a consulting firm, or by bringing in-house the skills and knowledge to implement the seven step process we outline below.

Step 1: Message Development

A foundation’s or non-profit organization’s “message” should be distinctive. What PR-types mean by the term “message” is a succinct, cogent statement of identity that conveys exactly what the entity most desires to communicate about itself. The message must be crafted so that it can be conveyed as a slogan or NPR tagline, a sixty second statement or reporter’s encapsulation, as a two paragraph mission statement or a three minute verbal presentation. Usually foundations devote much of their opening message to their history and their largest benefactors. Instead, foundations should focus creating their message on what the foundation is today, and what it wishes most to accomplish. A message clearly stating your foundation’s current goals will be remembered much better by your target audience than a message that states when the foundation began and summarizes its history. For example, few people can remember and articulate what the Ford, Rockefeller, Pew, Gates or Carnegie foundation sponsor in terms of grants and awards. And probably very few Americans know the name of the foundation that supported Jonas Salk and the creation of the polio vaccine.

The “new” distinctive message of a foundation should be a clear reflection of the new strategic focus of that foundation. Creating a clear, memorable and straightforward strategic focus, therefore, is one of the essential duties of a foundation in this new communications era.

A foundation’s message should stress what venture capitalists call the “sweet spot” – what is the foundation’s niche, what size or type of grants is it likely to give, what geographical restrictions does the foundation have and what does a foundation expect and demand from its grantees. Four excellent foundations, Ford, Citigroup, W.K. Kellogg and Morino post statements on their website that are typical of how foundations describe themselves. Each of these statements is too general to guide the reader to understand exactly what the foundation will fund and how the foundation will decide which proposals to fund and which ones to reject. Examples of their written messages are:

The Ford Foundation is a resource for innovative people and institutions worldwide. Our goals are to:

• Strengthen democratic values,
• Reduce poverty and injustice,
• Promote international cooperation and Advance human achievement [From the Ford Foundation website].

The Citigroup Foundation concentrates its giving in three areas: education, economic and community development, and quality of life. Through our grant dollars and Citigroup's businesses and employee volunteers, our strategy focuses on areas that offer the greatest opportunity to build economically strong, vibrant and self-sustaining communities and individuals. [From the Citigroup Foundation website].

Created in 1994, the Morino Institute is a nonprofit organization that explores the opportunities and risks of the Internet and the New Economy to advance social change. Our work is focused in four key areas: stimulating entrepreneurship, advancing a more effective philanthropy, closing social divides and understanding the relationship and impact of the Internet on our society. [From the Morino Institute website].

The mission of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation is "To help people help themselves through the practical application of knowledge and resources to improve their quality of life and that of future generations." [From the W.K. Kellogg Foundation website].

Statements like these are useful, but are not very clear in telling the world what the foundation will fund and what it will not fund. A more distinctive example of a clear message that is succinct and well focused is the following message from the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation.

The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation was established as a national philanthropy in 1972 and today it is the largest US foundation devoted to improving the health and health care of all Americans. We concentrate our grant making in four areas.

• to assure that all Americans have access to basic health care at reasonable cost;
• to improve care and support for people with chronic health conditions;
• to promote healthy communities and lifestyles; and
• to reduce the personal, social and economic harm caused by substance abuse — tobacco, alcohol, and illicit drugs. [From the Robert Woods Johnson Foundation website].

Our thesis is that a primary audience for the message of a foundation is the group of people working in areas that the foundation would like to fund. By creating a powerful, forward-looking message targeted to this ‘user group,’ a foundation can significantly improve the quality and the appropriateness of the proposals it receives for funding.

Many foundations are small, and may believe they should not let the world know much about what they fund. While this may help in keeping the number of grant applications “manageable,” by doing so, these foundations often unnecessarily limit the number of proposals they receive, thus limiting their quality and the impact grantees can have on the world using the foundations grant. We strongly believe that foundations in general, and the world at large, would benefit greatly from foundations receiving more high quality grant proposals.

Step 2: Identify and Effectively Target the Media Environment

Foundations should develop a comprehensive list of the publications and media in which they wish to present their message. Foundations are well advised to, and often have succeeded in targeting the right media (outlets) for each of the following:

• Where the foundation wishes to build ‘brand’ visibility and be quoted
• Where the foundation intends to publicize their grant making guidelines and process, informing applicants of opportunities and requirements
• Where the foundation wishes to broadcast the results of its grant awards so as to leverage its success

These media environments include not only TV shows on the hundreds of channels we now can access, but also the magazines, newspapers, journals, radio talk shows, internet sites and chat rooms that people now regularly inhabit. One secret learned by PR professionals is that the journalists responsible for programming these outlets are always on the lookout for contributors, talking heads, cogent quote-givers, and expert authorities. It is a win-win situation to help meet the journalists’ needs for information and at the same time promote your organization. By doing so, foundations can go far in furthering the institutional goals of the foundation. Other media outlets that should be of interest to foundations include trade shows, industry forums, community events and speaker panels. And, when a foundation sponsors its own educational or newsworthy event, a foundation can create its own media environment where journalists and reporters appreciate the opportunity to attend the event as invited guests. The larger media environment that should be on the radar screens of foundations also includes universities, think tanks, political campaigns, public service campaigns, newsletters and other information disseminators that touch the foundation’s external audience (the general public interested in the foundation’s mission) and internal audience (potential grantees or potential partners who may wish to co-fund one or more grants of the foundation).

Once the media environment is fully identified, the foundation must discover the editorial calendar for each publication, web site, university program and other information resource in order to ensure that the foundation can secure the media placements that it wants throughout the course of the year. One fact, known to few, is that a database exists that includes journalists and reporters who are currently writing articles on thousands of subjects – all of whom are looking for expert input and people to contribute to the story. Foundations are well advised to make significant efforts to secure low cost or pro bono access to this database so that they can be poised to give their input and unique perspective on stories currently being researched by journalists. By sharing the foundation’s expertise and the expertise of the grantees funded by the foundation, a foundation can go a long way to making well known the types of activities that it will fund, and what the foundation has to offer the world.

The foundation or non-profit organization must then impose on its newly generated editorial calendar the significant dates from the foundation’s internal lifecycle. Typically, these internal lifecycle calendar additions would include dates when the foundation announces the opening and closing of grant cycles, dates when awards are announced, dates selection committees are announced, and other predictable dates that warrant publicity. This calendar must be dynamically updated to reflect spontaneous events such as breakthroughs that have resulted from funding given to a grantee, the receipt of a large contribution, the creation of a new strategic alliance with a university, social service organization or other significant partner, or other similar event of importance to the foundation and the community at large. The PR calendar of a foundation can also include major speeches by the director of the foundation, conferences funded by the foundation and press releases resulting from policy or position statements made by the foundation of interest to the public.

Step 3: Message Deployment - Conferences, Trade Shows, Speeches, Seminars, Sponsorships, Links on Websites and Branding

Each and every foundation and non-profit stands for something. And because of that, people have donated their own money to contribute to society in ways the foundation facilitates. Foundations must spend at least five percent of their corpus on grants and administration of the foundation. Often, it is important not just to fund a scientist or a project, but it is equally as important to generate publicity about the project so that other foundations and philanthropic individuals become more willing and eager to give money to the cause that the foundation is funding. Communications strategies are often based on efforts to “get the word out.” However, even today in our virtual world, foundations must also “get the people out” to talk up their donations, their mission and to help lead the fight to address the highest priority social, economic, political or medical issues that the foundation addresses.

While there are foundations that support activities all over the world, like The Pew Charitable Trusts, they are a minority of the foundations in the world. Most foundations provide grants on a very local basis. The Lilly Endowment and The Andre Agassi Charitable Foundation, like most typical foundations, concentrate their grants on specific locations close to their home base. While this promotes a foundation being known in their locality, today’s high mobility and media competition still make it necessary to work hard to spread the word about your foundation in your locality through speeches, sponsorships and other avenues where foundation directors and employees actively participate in community activities.

An often ignored aspect of message deployment is media training, speech and voice training and image development for those who will be presenting material about the foundation in public settings. We all have endured the speech that was too long or too detailed or simplistic for those in the audience. Speeches that miss their mark, media opportunities that are squandered and voices or images that do not reflect the qualities and commitment of a foundation can be avoided by proper selection of personnel and training of those responsible for communicating on behalf of the foundation. While everyone need not hire Lillian Brown, an image and communications consultant to seven US presidents, and while everyone can not be as articulate as Mitt Romney is on behalf of the Winter Olympics, foundations can no longer go into the public eye without the right personnel and proper training and expect to take full advantage of the rare opportunities afforded to them to make the best and most lasting impression possible on the audience.

Message deployment certainly includes the use of newsletters, websites, brochures and other means to distribute the foundation’s message. This deployment can be done quite inexpensively, and can produce substantial results in terms of greater numbers of grant applicants, higher quality of grant applicants, higher visibility for grant recipients, improved performance by grant recipients and improved visibility for the issue that the foundation addresses.

Step 4: Media Monitoring

Media monitoring is the method a foundation or non-profit organization would use to check its own placements, keep abreast of what others are saying about the foundation and its grant recipients, and promote a foundation’s ability to keep its general audience, plus its donors, awards committee members and grantees abreast of foundation activities.

The invention of the internet has made media monitoring much easier. Just 30 years ago, clipping services, hired on retainer, read every magazine, every newspaper, every newsletter and watched every TV show where there was some likelihood of a mention of a client organization. Today, this can be done electronically, and through data mining techniques we are improving our ability to analyze the responses to individual media insertions, so that we know which insertions have resulted in more applicants for grant awards and an elevated awareness of the foundation and its mission.

From our experience, media monitoring is often overlooked as a key component of a communications strategy. We believe that media monitoring and careful analysis by the foundation of the media stories related to the foundation’s mission can go a long way toward creating a living, expanding community of interest around the foundation.

Step 5 – Advertising

Whether you call it advertising, marketing or sponsorship, foundations need to advertise both their existence and their good works. Whether it is through sponsorship of an event, paying for an ad in a newspaper or TV, buying a public service announcement on NPR or local public TV station, or even buying ball point pens, coffee mugs or branded umbrellas, foundations need to generate more name recognition for themselves in their community. Foundations can measure such efforts in terms of cost per thousand stakeholders reached. Foundations should compare ad rates in target broadcast media with other forms of publicity such as direct marketing, sponsorships or handouts. By analyzing the cost/benefit ratio of these advertising expenditures a foundation can rationally allocate its scarce resources to achieve the best impact for its dollar.

Step 6 – Contributor (and Potential Contributor) Relations

No communication strategy can be complete without a strong emphasis on contributor relations. Foundations often excel in this area. Earlier we showed how keeping your contributors informed about the latest developments of interest to the foundation can pay tremendous dividends to the foundation’s sense of community. Now, more importantly, communication strategies focusing on contributors can improve the foundation’s capacity to secure larger contributions from those who have given before, and those identified as prospective donors. In addition to the foundation’s ongoing public relations activities, an excellent website and a host of contributor events such as awards dinners, issue forums, volunteer events and other gatherings of contributors and potential contributors all have the advantage of both promoting the foundation and creating important social capital among the foundation’s community of interest.

Step 7 – Applicant, Grantee (and Potential Grantee) Relations

Many foundations have a “closed” award process where its committee selects grantees through a secret process. If a foundation wanted to have a more transparent and well publicized award process, there would be a great opportunity to capture significant media attention as well as improve grantee and potential grantee relations. While it is far beyond the scope of this article to define a completely open or transparent awards process, a transparent application process could include public dissemination of the grant award criteria, names and approved biographies of board members, a timetable for acceptances and rejections of grant applications, and a clear explanation of all relevant considerations that go into deciding which grant applications to fund and which ones not to fund.

Foundations might want to consider following the example of the Sevin Rosen venture capital firm. In 2000, the firm hired a public relations director whose main job was to generate PR for the companies in which Sevin Rosen invested. While the person also generated PR for Sevin Rosen itself, the idea of a venture capital firm’s own internal PR person promoting the companies in which it invested, so as to enhance the value of the activities of the companies in which Sevin Rosen had invested, has much to teach foundations. When making grant awards, the grantee’s ability and willingness to work with the foundation to generate the appropriate level of public information about the work performed by the grantee should be an important consideration of an application’s merit. While the rigor of announcing quarterly earnings reports to Wall Street is not exactly the model to demand of grantees, clearly regular reports with specific blueprints for external communication must be demanded of grantees of the future. For example, few people know about the Congressional Youth Award or the Rotary Foundation Scholarships for graduate study abroad. Both scholarship programs would be well served to encourage their recipients, the students, to promote the knowledge of their programs throughout the broader community. If they did so, the number of applicants for both of these incredibly worthy programs would increase substantially and the quality of applicants would in all likelihood rise as well.

Today, a foundation can use communication strategies to become as “transparent” or open as it wants to be. Forward-looking foundations may wish to make their entire awards process open and accessible to the public. The foundation could post every grant application on its website. It could publish in great detail its award criteria. It could publish the entire scoring process by each member of the award selection committee, including all notes of the reviewers and show the final ranking of each and every applicant for the grant award. In addition, if the foundation had an appeals process, it could publish the results of the appeal. This approach would lend a tremendous amount of accountability to the foundation grant making process and a tremendous amount of prestige and trust from its stakeholders. A small amount of added transparency can return huge returns on investment in terms of higher quality grant opportunities.

Conclusion

This seven step communication process will result in better community outreach for foundations. It will result in more and higher quality grant applications, greater involvement of the community and society at large in the issues of concern to the foundation, and will go far to strengthen the bonds of interest and investment surrounding the foundation. These communication strategies are equally applicable to the small family foundation as they are to the Gates Foundation. And ultimately, no matter how large or small the foundation, we believe that an on-going communications strategy following these seven steps will your foundation stay strong, vibrant and promote its growth into the future.

back