With all of the focus on online giving and the importance of using email campaigns to boost fundraising, many charities seemingly forget that wise use of the media can be a dramatic boost to their efforts and results. After all, both traditional and social media are great platforms to influence social agendas that affect your cause and that make it fast, easy and economical to get the word out about your non-profit’s mission.

One of the biggest draws to using the media to gain support for your cause is that it’s often free or low cost to use, so the return on the investment of your time is often high. In the past, newspaper articles and televised newscasts were traditional ways to draw attention to fundraising events and the communities that benefit from the good work that non-profit’s do, but online publications and social media networks make it even easier to help your organisation stand out and gain supporters.

Share Your Opinion

Editorials, Op-ed pieces in both printed and online publications as well as guest posts on prominent blogs are the perfect way to harness the power of the media to draw attention to your cause. These particular media channels are especially helpful if you are trying to promote a specific social movement or change in public opinion that will benefit your non-profit’s service community. This type of approach can also be tied to promoting a specific fundraising event. If you decide to utilise these channels, remember to adhere to standard advocacy guidelines when promoting your cause in the media.

When you compose your posts, make certain that it fits the submission guidelines for that specific media outlet and that you tailor the message in each submission to reach your particular target audience.  When creating your post, explain your non-profit’s mission, as well as how a change in public policy will benefit your service community. Close your post by helping your readers understand what actions they need to take to help your non-profit fulfill its mission and reach its goals.

While attention in larger media outlets can be great, don’t neglect to target smaller specialty and niche media outlets whose audience is more likely to be involved in your service community and therefore have a greater interest in the mission of your non-profit.

Boost the Reach of Your Message by Cross Sharing on Social Media

According to a recent article [link: http://www.nptechforgood.com/2014/06/08/14-must-know-stats-about-fundraising-social-media-and-mobile-technology/] in Non-Profit Tech For Good, 55% of the people that engage with nonprofits through social media become motivated to take further action.

So, as you reach out to media to gain support for your cause, don’t forget to use social media posts as well to help you get the word out. Promote the publication of media posts about your non-profit across all of your social media channels. Include links and buttons that make it easy for your supporters to access and share these posts with their own network of friends and contacts so that you can improve the reach of your message and strengthen its impact.

Consider purchasing the reprint rights to your most successful media posts and then resending them with a targeted message to your email list to further increase your reach and results.

Don’t forget to Test Your Messages and Measure Your Results

When you are creating posts, don’t forget to test the messages that you are sending and to measure the results for each media source. Doing so will help you to discover what types of approaches will earn the best response for your non-profit. This way you can narrow your focus to place great emphasis and attention on the specific media channels that produce the greatest results.

Content on your non-profit’s website and your email list remain the best ways to encourage support for your cause, but social media and other traditional media outlets also have an increasingly important role to play in your ability to spread the message about your non-profit’s mission.