Where to list your volunteering opportunities

Nov 27
By benmatthews |
Posted in How To | Tagged , , , , , | 6 Comments

 

Bright One is busy, busy, busy as usual. We’ve got lots of exciting charities looking for our support and we always need to find lots of high quality volunteers (as many charities and non-profit organisations like us us do…).

We regularly list our current volunteering opportunities, as well as retain a general application for volunteers not sure about what project they’d like to help on.

But where else can you list volunteering roles to attract more volunteers for specific positions, and generally?

We’ve compiled a list of places where you can find and promote volunteering opportunities below. Got a site to add? Let us know in the comments!

General volunteering opportunities:

Sector specific:

Location specific:

2012 PR Graduate Schemes

Nov 25
By benmatthews |
Posted in BrightOne News, How To, News | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

 

The PR industry continues to grow and many agencies are seeing the value on running a formal grad scheme to attract the brightest and best new talent.

The ever-awesome Ben Cotton over at Social Web Thing has once again done a fantastic job of compiling a post on PR Graduate Schemes from some of the best agencies in the UK.

But with more competition than ever, you may need to differentiate yourself from the pack. Why not find out about volunteering with Bright One and you’ll be able to add that little extra to your CV that really shows you are one of the best!

And if you’re a PR agency looking to promote your grad scheme, just get in touch and we’ll add you to the list.

2012 PR Graduate Schemes

Blue Rubicon
Open
Closes: 22 January 2012

Burson-Marseller
Does not run a PR graduate scheme, but is open for internships all year round, many of which lead to permanent positions.

Chime Comms
Open: November
Closes:

Diffusion 
Open: November
Closes:

Edelman 
Open: 1 December 2011
Closes:

Fishburn Hedges
Open
Closes: The deadline for the April 2012 intake is 12 December 2011 and the deadline for the September 2012 intake is 3 February 2012.

Fleishman-Hillard
Open
Operates a six month training scheme all year round. On completion of the Graduate Scheme the candidates performance will be reviewed and, if satisfactory, graduates will be considered for a permanent position.

Four Comms 
Open
Closed: 31 January 2012

Hill & Knowlton 
Closed: 28 October 2011

Hotwire Group (encompassing Hotwire and Skywrite)
Open: November/December 2011
Closes: 30 January 2012

Ketchum Pleon: James Maxwell Programme
 Open
Closes: 30 March 2012

Lexis PR
Open: November 2011
Closes: 20th February

Speed Comms
Open: 30 November 2011
Closes: 19 January 2012

Huffington Post UK launches Impact section

Nov 23
By nickstanton |
Posted in News | Tagged , | 3 Comments

Last Friday saw the launch of a new section of the, still relatively new itself, Huffington Post UK. The new Impact section is “dedicated to issues, charities and making a difference” — so that’s up our street, right? Well yes, it definitely is and so I’d urge everyone to take a look and see what people are writing but more importantly think about getting in touch with them and writing something about your campaign.

The launch saw some big names pen blogs about themselves and their current campaigns – including people from Gingerbread, Barnardo’s, UNICEF and my boss at Citizens Advice – and if the US version is anything to go by it may well become an important campaigning platform.
If you’re thinking about pitching your idea to the Impact team (details of how to do that are here) then here’s our three top tips for writing a blog:

1. Say one thing

This is a useful tip for any writing but when you’re blogging try and just say one thing. Of course you can have a multi-faceted argument but throughout you should have a single common theme. You also don’t have very long (the Huffington Post recomend blogs between 500-800 words) so you just won’t have the room for that 30-page policy consultation you’ve been working on.

2. Write it as you, the individual

If you pitch to the Huffington Post you’ll be doing that as an individual so when you write a post don’t revert back to being an organisation. This can be tricky, especially if you’re used to talking as part of a bigger organisation, but once you start it’ll get easier.

This is also a good time to think about who blogs. You should start by thinking about who has the most interesting story to tell – your Chief Executive will have a great insight into policy but your frontline workers will be much better placed to talk about other areas.

3. It doesn’t end when you see your blog on the screen

Last week I heard the Huffington Post UK editor-in-chief, Carla Buzasi, talk about their model and one of the main things she stressed was the importance of using blogger’s networks to promote blogs. In short, when you blog, tell your friends and contacts to read it!

Also, whereas if you write an opinion piece for a newspaper you may, at the most, get a letter from a reader in response. With blogs feedback is more immediate and part of the process so keep an eye on the comment box and if anyone asks you a questions, answer it.

Bright One Volunteer is a Team London Star

Nov 20
By Tove |
Posted in BrightOne News | Tagged , , | 2 Comments

We’re very proud to see one of our Bright One volunteers – Oana Munteanu – as one of the Team London Stars in the Mayor of London’s latest volunteering programme. Team London is a programme which aims to make volunteering easier to do and easier to find out about and the focus is on areas such as cutting crime, improving quality of life and increasing youth opportunities.  

The recently launched advertising campaign includes our brilliant volunteer Oana as one of the Team London Stars who have all been nominated due to their volunteering efforts in the capital and they will hopefully inspire others to volunteer. “I think this is a really nice project because not only does it give recognition to people who give up their time to help others but it also promotes them as role models so other people will follow in their footsteps”, says Oana who is hoping to inspire others to take part in volunteering activities. When asked about her favourite aspects of volunteering Oana stated that it is “when you see the results of your work and put a smile on other people’s faces”.

 

“If someone is thinking to volunteer but doesn’t know how, I would advise him/her to do whatever he/she likes best. I think that transforming your hobby or interest into voluntary work is the biggest motivation and it will bring satisfaction to yourself and the people who benefit from your volunteering.”

 

Big congrats to Oana from the Bright One team!

 

If you would like to volunteer with Bright One or would like to know more about volunteering opportunities we’d love to hear from you! Send us an email via the contact page or drop us a line on Twitter @brightone

Event report: How to Build a Social Brand at Weber Shandwick

Nov 18
By nickstanton |
Posted in events | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

 

Last week, Weber Shandwick London hosted a great breakfast seminar to talk through the findings of their Socialising Your Brand study and to share their approach to building a social brand.

Speakers:

The excellent speakers were able to share some of the best examples from their clients and the findings from their study can give us all food for thought. The study examines closely what ‘world class’ social brands do differently from the rest and identifies nine drivers of sociability which we should all look at.

The infographic and executive summary are definitely worth a read for the details but some of the key points that stood out during the event are:

1. Weight given to social

One of the big things that stuck out from the study was that this year the EMEA brand managers surveyed attributed 52% of their brands overall reputation to how social it is. That’s up from 44% last year and for anyone having to make a case internally that digital needs more resource, it’s definitely a good stat to use.

On top of this, charities need to keep in mind the proportion social plays in our brands. A corporate brand manager may attribute 52% of their brand to social but they are also probably weighing up extensive paid advertising and other contributing factors that charities can only dream of! It’ll vary from charity to charity but it seems likely to me that digital might play a bigger part than 52% in our brands.

2. Listening more than you talk

The speakers really tried to drive home that you almost can’t listen too much and what you hear, has to be dealt with. For non-profits this is important because we can, and therefore should, do it. It’s not too expensive or technical, if anything it’s something we’re already good at doing.

The ‘world class’ social brands are twice as likely to change a product or service based on social interactions than the others. Chris Perry used a great example from Weber’s US office to demonstrate this at its best. American Airlines began rolling out free Wi-Fi on their domestic flights but while the roll-out wasn’t quite complete they began getting some criticism from people who got a flight to find it didn’t have Wi-Fi. In response they built a very simple widget, aawifiwidget.com, which let people check before flying which over 3 million people used.

3. Break your own news

We’re all now accustomed to using social to publish our own stories but Chris Perry encouraged us to break our own news. I can completely see the benefit of this for digital teams but as a member of a press office this made me a little worried because there are some important traditional media who don’t want to touch stories once they’ve broken elsewhere.

In fairness, the speakers did encourage us to think in terms of the Weber Shandwick’s Content Fusion model which would give you more content and allow you to save the big ticket items for your key tradition media contacts.

Finally, I’ll end the same way the event ended. Social media is like teen sex: every one’s talking about it; few people understand it; and even less people are doing it well.

A selection of tweets can be seen here: storify.com/socialising-your-brand-weber-shandwick

Why Marketing Is Not a Magic Bullet

Nov 14
By Tove |
Posted in How To | Tagged , | 1 Comment

 

 

When I talk to marketers in other organisations, the same themes come up time and again. “My colleagues often use marketing in the same way as a panic button,” says one senior charity marketer. “They bring my team in at the tail end of a project and expect us to resolve issues that should have been dealt with at the beginning.” A marketing director who I know well agreed, saying that “Marketing and communications are not just the last minute fancy packaging. Getting my organisation to understand this is an ongoing challenge.”

 As pressure mounts and budgets tighten, we all inevitably have to do more with less. But that’s all the more reason to make sure that organisations get the best use out of their resources, including marketing and communications professionals. There are many people out there who still confuse marketing with promotion, such as advertising, fliers, or events. But, as I’ve said in a recent case study for Knowledge Peers , marketing is about understanding what your target audience needs. Every organisation that gets to grips with this concept will see tremendous value from their marketing team.

 Equally, marketers have a responsibility to educate their colleagues about the best ways to work with them, and to manage expectations. This is easier said than done in tough times when every department is trying to prove their worth. I know many marketers who agree to every request for help, then end up being spread far too thinly. Ultimately this helps no-one.

So here are some tips about the best ways for marketing to work together with other departments:

  1. Involve marketing early on. Since marketing is about understanding what your audience needs, it’s a good idea to involve marketing in the planning stages of any project as well as product development. Good marketers will have valuable insights into your target audience and therefore ideas on how your plans will play out with them, which will help enormously with whatever you’re trying to do.
  2. Use marketing as a sounding board. Marketers are the channel to your market. They know what your stakeholders are thinking, and they also have a unique overview of all the challenges and opportunities that your organisation faces. So why not ask for our take on fundamentals, such as what are you trying to do, and what success looks like? A good marketer will give you an honest, balanced and constructive opinion. We’re good at kicking ideas around too.
  3. Use marketing to facilitate planning. Okay, who are we really trying to reach here, and what do we want them to remember about us? I’ve seen good projects fail because organisations haven’t agreed these areas. If you’re not sure- or even if you are- get a senior marketing colleague to facilitate a session for your department where you look at the options and evaluate and test them. It will save you a lot of time and money if you get this right early on. 
  4. Marketers need to manage expectations. With resources at a premium, if you’re a marketer you need to be clear about if and when you can help, and to be realistic about timescales and budgets. You can’t always pull rabbits out of hats, so don’t feel you have to pretend you can. It all comes down to the fine art of stakeholder management, which is a large but rarely discussed element of any marketing role

Now more than ever, working together at the right time in the right way is the way to maximise the impact of any organisation’s marketing and communications expertise. No-one loses and everyone wins – and surely win-win is the best outcome of all?

PS If you’re a recent graduate and want to get some great experience in charity marketing I’m currently looking for an intern. Find out more here

 

Zoe Amar is Head of Marketing and Business Development at Lasa, a charity which provides services to Shelter, Age UKand thousands of other charities across the UK. She is also on the Bright One board and she is a regular personal commentator and speaker on charity marketing, contributing to The Guardian and Charity Comms. Zoe is also a Chartered Marketer and tweets from @zoeamar

PRCA Charity Campaign Masterclass

Nov 11
By Tove |
Posted in BrightOne News | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

 

This week, Founding Director of Bright One, Ben Matthews, spoke at a PRCA Charity Campaign Masterclass, alongside David Hamilton of Action for Children.

Below are his slides, which covers three exciting charities and the tactics they use for successful campaigns: The Pixel Project, Centrepoint, and Child’s i Foundation.

What tips have you got for others to master their charity campaigns?

View more presentations from Bright One

2 PR & Marketing Internships Up For Grabs at @BrightOne

Nov 10
By benmatthews |
Posted in BrightOne News | Leave a comment

Every day that Bright One progresses, we see the fantastic work that our volunteers do for charities and for Bright One itself.  We want to help support more organisations with their communications needs.

For that to happen, we’ll need more volunteers to work in teams and help these clients achieve their goals. But we also need to look after our current volunteers and clients, as we want to make sure our current clients continue to get a fantastic level of service.

And that needs lots of support. Which is where our intern positions come in…

The Role

Bright One is a volunteer-run communications agency for the third sector. Our team is on hand to offer charities, social enterprises and other not-for-profit organisations affordable yet effective PR and communications campaigns. We help organisations get their messages heard and offer resources so they can focus on core activities.

We’re looking for several interns to help us develop our organisation at a critical time.

You will find yourself:

  • Helping third sector organisations make a bigger difference
  • Developing your professional skills, such as leadership or team management
  • Networking with other volunteers
  • Establishing contacts with other agencies, charities and industry related organisations

Your roles and responsibilities will include:

  • Help to create and implement a Marketing, PR and Communications plan
  • Identify appropriate media publications to target
  • Drafting and distribution of press releases
  • Create and update social media channels around appropriate projects
  • Identify awards opportunities
  • Help with the development and implementation of the website
  • Join in the sourcing of information for, and the writing of, the monthly newsletter
  • Help in the organising of events
  • Use the CRM database (currently SalesForce) as a marketing and volunteer management tool

Required Skills:

  • Good organisational and planning skills
  • Excellent written and verbal communication
  • The ability to work on multiple projects at one time
  • Good attention to detail and accuracy
  • Strong IT skills
  • Good knowledge of marketing techniques
  • Self initiative

Apply Now

You can apply for this position by sending a CV and covering letter to ben@brightone.org.uk, or by applying on the role listing on Enternships.com.

If you’ve got any questions about the role or want to find out more, leave a comment below or drop Ben an email on the address above.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Event report: Building an effective social media campaign

Nov 8
By nickstanton |
Posted in events | Tagged , | 2 Comments

 

Along with quite a few other charity PRs (well, it was a free event after all!) the Bright One blog enjoyed an afternoon of tea, political campaigning and social media at Building an Effective Social Media Campaign, courtesy of the Hansard Society and the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC).

The awful 3G reception on the Parliamentary estate made for an interesting background to an event on social media campaigning, but while the audience’s check-in’s failed and tweets stalled the great speakers had some interesting things to say.

The panel

  • Dr Andy Williamson (Chair) - Digital strategist and former Director of the Hansard Society’s Digital Democracy Programme.
  • Mark Pack – Head of Digital at MHP Communications and co-editor of Lib Dem Voice, the largest Liberal Democrat blog.
  • Dr Jullian Huppert MP - MP for Cambridge, the first MP to join Twitter and still an avid tweeter.
  • Baroness Ruth Deech - Crossbench peer and one of the few Lords to blog and tweet
  • Elizabeth Linder – Politics and Government Specialist at Facebook.
  • Clifford Singer – the founder of mydavidcameron.com and currently working on falseeconomy.org.uk campaign against Government spending cuts.

The discussion moved from the Arab Spring to the General Election, via embryo fertilisation, but some common themes did emerge:

1. Danger of preaching to the converted

Several of the panel said that one of the main things online campaigners needed to guard against was appealing to people who already agreed with the campaign aims.

Clifford Singer used the example of his current project, False Economy, where they’ve tried to move away from simple “David Cameron bashing” which will get a lot of likes but doesn’t really move the campaign or debate forward. Julian Huppert agreed and he thought the Yes 2 AV campaign had become an echo chamber where people who agreed with each other spoke about how much they agreed.

2. Interaction between offline and online

The audience was reminded that their online campaigns will rely on their offline work and vice versa.

Mark Pack highlighted the great piece of social media campaigning from Tunisian protesters which used Google Earth to show where the presidential plane had taken the first lady on her many corruption funded shopping trips (available here). Mark pointed out that this was done four years before the revolution and despite it being a great piece of work it made little impact and it wasn’t until offline action had caught up that the campaign aims were reached.

3. User generated content

With Clifford Singer — creator of some great participative campaigns — speaking, it’s unsurprising that user generated content was encouraged. Clifford said that the blank myDavidCameron template was almost an after thought but they quickly saw how important it was.

When encouraging others to create things for your campaign, authenticity was stressed by those on the receiving end of much lobbying. Julian Huppert and Baroness Deech both warned against standardised emails especially. Julian’s office has got around 12,000 constituent’s emails in the last year and an extra 500 identical campaign emails makes his job harder — he encouraged people to just come to his constituency surgeries, and avoid online altogether. Baroness Deech echoed this, saying that, despite the 140 character limit, she really liked getting tweets because someone has to take the time to write it.

The few tweets that got through can be seen here: storify.com/building-an-effective-social-media-campaign

This post was written by one of our new Bright One bloggers – Nick Stanton. Nick is experienced working in press and public affairs at regional, national, and international charities. Nick will be blogging regularly on the Bright One blog so make sure you keep an eye out for his next post!

Londoners Volunteer Fundraising Advice

Nov 6
By Tove |
Posted in How To | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

With the eurozone problems deepening and the UK facing the likely repercussions, it is harder than ever for charities to reach their fundraising targets. While some, such as WaterAid and Macmillan Cancer Support, have not been adversely affected by the economic climate, others (often those with less tangible ROI for donors) have been.

Here is some positive guidance both for Bright One volunteers and for charities big and small, that they may flourish in these ‘hard times’. In order to get a proper insight into the all-important ‘target market’, agency Burnett Works carried out interviews with Londoners who volunteered some useful fundraising tips:

DO

  • Be unique… innovative… unusual… inventive… - It pays to spend that extra time browsing through your mind’s eye to find an original way of fundraising. The story on the street is that the same old fundraising initiatives are tired and uninspiring to potential donors. An injection of blue sky thinking is needed to pull fundraising outside the box and start inspiring people to donate
  • Communicate your USP, services and benefits clearly, sharing your results with potential donors. This may seem like teaching grandma to suck eggs but the larger charities have demonstrated how promoting a tangible ROI for donors can boost voluntary income. Cancer Research UK’s ‘Your Story’ DM campaign in September 2010 thanked donors for their support and included a story about how a person local to each area was helped. Despite there being no ‘ask’ on the DM, the campaign raised more than £20,000
  • Transparency is one of the most important Fundraising Principles – people like to know where their money is going.  Therefore, be honest about where the fundraising money goes – integrity is a highly prized virtue
  • ‘Target markets’ are often lazy and so, once you have attracted their attention, you need to make donating as easy as possible, so that they can do so before losing interest. Text giving has revolutionised donating; capitalise on it
  • Treat your donors as you would your best clients, because they are. Keep in touch with regular donors; a personal phone call to thank them and explain where their money’s going is well worth its salt.

DON’T

  • Send chuggers out. The important thing to take away from this is that no one likes being coerced, pressured or made to feel guilty. Instead, show the positive difference that donations can make and people will be more happy to make a positive decision themselves
  • A point made by one person: do not send tickets that donors then have to sell. Again, allow people to make their own decisions; although do offer constructive assistance to encourage them. Macmillan Cancer Support’s unique website be.macmillan.org.uk does just that, offering fundraisers support for any event they choose to hold.

If you have any other ideas for what charities should or should not be doing to increase their fundraising income, please feel free to post them below. Similarly, if you have any questions for Bright One about fundraising, we would love to hear from you.

 

This post was written by one of our new Bright One bloggers – Sophie Munro. Sophie is a marketing professional with several years’ experience, who has worked in the Third Sector in both paid and voluntary roles. She will be blogging regularly on the Bright One blog so make sure you keep an eye out for her next post!