Advocacy campaigns drive society to consistently progress toward a better, more livable world. They bring attention to issues that hold us back and empower supporters to take specific actions that are aimed at addressing and resolving those problems. From reducing greenhouse gas emissions to creating more livable home environments for at-risk youth, and everything in between, advocacy campaigns have the potential to drive real progress for your cause.
However, there’s more to advocacy campaigns than just choosing something you want to change. You first need to define exactly what it is you want to achieve, find others who share that belief, and then mobilize them to pursue that change with the right tools and resources.
If you’re new to advocacy, all of that can seem daunting as you get started, especially in a digital-first and socially-isolated environment. However, numerous organizations have been in your shoes before — brand new to the concept and not knowing where to start. Those who were once beginners are now seasoned professionals. Now, their organizations have found success in these campaigns, and there are plenty of examples that you can draw from to maximize the potential success of your campaign.
Whether this will be your first advocacy campaign or you just want to brush up on the basics, this beginner’s guide will help you set the foundation for your campaign. Here’s what we’ll cover:
Taking these key steps will position your organization to host a campaign that not only inspires change in your community but also deepens others’ passion for the cause you’re pursuing. If you’re ready to explore the world of nonprofit advocacy, let’s jump in!
Before you invest in software for your advocacy campaign and start reaching out to people, you have to understand the ultimate end goal of your campaign. Advocates need a common goal to rally behind and work toward, and it’s important that you’re able to communicate this upfront. Otherwise, you’ll have a hard time getting people on board.
You’ll need to be specific about what you want to achieve. For instance, it’s not enough to say, “We want to pass the climate action bill.” Instead, you might say, “We want to inspire 10 members of Congress to vote in favor of the greenhouse gas tax during the next congressional session.” That type of goal lends itself to very specific actions that you can perform and metrics you can use to assess performance.
This also allows you to set smaller goals along the way and define specific actions that will ultimately help you achieve your overall objective. Knowing this early on will help you communicate to advocates what exact steps you need them to take in order to affect change, which we’ll discuss in the next section.
From here, you’ll be able to identify the people who are in a position to make the change you’re pursuing. Salsa’s guide to advocacy campaign planning explains that could mean targeting a group of people, such as getting the majority of state senators to pass a bill through. Another example of targeting a group would be reaching out to citizens. It could also be a specific individual, such as getting the owner of a local business to stop using plastic straws or styrofoam containers for takeout orders.
In the first example, getting 10 members of Congress might require a mini-campaign to convince each of the members, and each of those campaigns might have its messaging and volunteers based in a specific geographical area.
Regardless of whether you’re fighting against gun violence or working to reduce tobacco use among youth, every activity you choose plays an important role in achieving the goal you set at the start of your campaign.
From fundraising to protesting, the actions you ask your supporters to take will ultimately define your success. Tasks that don’t have a clear impact on your campaign will ultimately work against you by wasting advocates’ time and devaluing their commitment to the cause. To help you choose which activities make the most sense for your campaign, let’s review a few common actions that advocacy campaign leaders typically ask people to take:
These are just a few of the many activities you can have advocates engage in to reach your goal. As we’ll explore later, dedicated advocacy software empowers you to streamline many of these activities, bringing your efforts to the expansive digital world and enabling you to make large-scale efforts.
Whether your advocates will collect petition signatures, write letters to local lawmakers, or even organize a protest, make sure it puts you on the path to achieving your ultimate objective.
Knowing what change you want to make and how you’ll accomplish that is only half the battle. The other half deals with recruiting the right people to conduct outreach and then empowering them with the tools to incite that change.
Those who are already familiar with your organization will often be the most passionate and motivated to help your campaign succeed.
Looking at your nonprofit’s customer relationship management system, look for those who have demonstrated a commitment to your cause. This might include donors, volunteers, event attendees, board members, and past advocates.
EveryAction’s guide to nonprofit CRMs explains that you should be able to store key information about constituents that indicates their level of commitment to your work. This makes it easy to identify groups (or segments) of people to whom you might appeal for help. For instance, you can look at their gift history, volunteer work, advocacy involvement (including issues they care about and their preferred methods for taking action), or even use custom notes to call out important information shared during one-on-one conversations.
However, don’t limit yourself only to existing supporters. You can also tap into their networks through peer-to-peer outreach. Ask supporters to join your movement and invite their friends to do so, too. This can be as simple as including a share button on your petition or asking them to share a social media post from your organization.
You can also use a distributed event tool to create events in support of your campaign and let friends tap into their own networks to force multiply your outreach. This strategy allows you to connect with like-minded individuals who share the same values as people who already believe in your mission.
From here, amplify your outreach by posting opportunities to volunteer feeds where people are actively looking for opportunities they’re passionate about. By taking a multifaceted approach to recruitment, you’ll connect with people who are motivated to make your advocacy campaign succeed in no time.
Effective advocacy campaigns stem from strong relationships with your local community leaders and lawmakers at the local, state, and federal levels. Especially when you inspire a large pool of advocates, your campaigns’ participants will likely be well-connected in their communities.
Existing relationships provide the opportunity for an open, more natural conversation, and you can leverage the trust that your advocates have already built to push change forward. Whether they’re communicating with lawmakers or local business owners, ask your constituents about any connections they might have.
If your constituents don’t have connections, forge new ones by doing the following:
While one-on-one meetings are a great way to develop relationships, they’re not always easy to schedule. Legislators among other community leaders often have busy schedules, so you have to be creative when searching for different ways to engage with them.
Remember, local elected officials, like mayors and city council members, often influence elected leaders above them, like congresspeople and senators. Sometimes going through the local leader can have more of an effect than going directly to the target of your campaign. These few strategies will help your advocates start forming connections or deepening the ones they’ve already made.
In today’s digital-first world, you can’t get by without leveraging advocacy software to power your campaign. Digital tools will help you recruit advocates to join your campaign and enable them to complete the activities that are incremental to your campaign’s success. By streamlining backend processes, you’ll ultimately help amplify your organization’s voice.
Backed by dedicated tools, you’ll gain access to helpful features to power your campaign, such as:
This is just a glimpse into the numerous advocacy tools that will empower your campaign team. Create your campaign, keep your supporters in the loop, and reach your goals when you leverage tools that will enable you to do so quickly and easily.
Winning your campaign requires clear goals, targets, and activities that support your objective combined with an empowered base of support and the technology that will support your efforts. While daunting when looked at as a whole, running your first advocacy campaign doesn’t have to be overly complicated. Use these powerful tips as your foundation and build on them as you start to craft your strategy.
At this stage, we hope you feel much more empowered and confident to start your first nonprofit advocacy campaign. Now, get out there, call attention to an issue you feel passionate about, and make the world a better place!