The Situation
Give Day Tampa Bay is a 24-hour online giving challenge led by the Community Foundation of Tampa Bay and the Florida Next Foundation. The event showcases local nonprofits in the Tampa Bay area and provides incentives and bonuses to participating organizations throughout the day.
Realizing the power of publicity in engaging the community and rallying support, Give Day Tampa Bay engaged True Blue Communications for a 3-month news media relations program to manage publicity for the event.
For budget-conscious nonprofits, publicity programs are a great way to increase awareness at a lower cost than traditional advertising and marketing activities.
The Solution
Our team began the engagement with extensive media research and a media training session for all representatives who might participate in media interviews. We recommended several story angles that aligned with the key messages the Give Day team wanted to convey, and worked with Give Day representatives to gather information and schedule media interviews.
“It was hugely helpful knowing that we didn’t have to manage any of the moving parts of the PR activity, because there were plenty of other areas that our team had to corral,” said Wilma Norton, director of marketing and communications for the Community Foundation of Tampa Bay.
Through our targeted media outreach, we were able to secure coverage on every major TV news station in the Tampa Bay area and both daily newspapers. In addition, PSAs aired on numerous local radio stations. This coverage totaled more than 20 million audience impressions for print, online and broadcast news outlets alone.
“We had an immense amount of exposure and felt like every avenue was covered, and covered well,” said Norton. “It seemed like every time I turned on the TV or opened the newspaper I saw something about Give Day.”
In total, Give Day Tampa Bay raised $1.73 million for 550 local nonprofits in just 24 hours – an impressive number for an event in its second year.
The Experience
“Everyone felt completely at ease knowing that True Blue knew what they were doing and had our back,” said Norton. “And there was a willingness from them to say ‘we’re happy to go through this with you again’ and ‘we’re happy to do whatever will make you feel your best in this interview and make Give Day its best’.”
“If you’re looking for a public relations team, I would say just call True Blue and talk to them and that will be enough. You will quickly hear that they know what they’re doing, have a broad spectrum of experience, and are the kind of people that you want to be spending your time and money with.”