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When a January winter storm swept across Oregon, causing hundreds of thousands of families to lose power, Jacki Ward Kehrwald at Partners for a Hunger-Free Oregon was concerned that meant thousands of families who rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), formerly known as food stamps, might go hungry.
“A power outage can be devastating for families facing food insecurity because often they cannot afford to replace the food they lost, which means the kids and the entire family don’t have the food they need,” she explained. “What many people don’t know is that SNAP has replacement benefits for food lost during weather-related events. My responsibility is to get the word out to Oregonians that they might be able to get replacement benefits.”
For many nonprofit communicators, calling and pitching reporters can feel daunting. They wonder if the news media will take them seriously or if they care about their issues. At Movement Communications Academy, we demystify the process of working with reporters, explore strategies for crafting newsworthy pitches and build our students’ confidence to take risks.
Working with the News Media is one of the trainings included in the Oregon Communications Academy. Applications are open through March 22. Learn more here.
At the time of the storm, Jacki was participating in our first Oregon Academy cohort, where 19 nonprofit communicators were learning the fundamentals of strategy, messaging, planning, digital, media relations, and policy communications.
Jacki took advantage of our weekly office hours to get advice on breaking through with the news media to get the story covered. “I sent a press release and have not heard back from anyone,” she explained.
We helped her hone her approach, giving her talking points to make follow-up calls to reporters and newsdesks, which is critical to breaking through with news reporters who have many competing stories.
After our 1:1 coaching session, Jacki called several reporters. “Calling newsrooms was definitely not as scary as I thought,” Jacki explained. “Most of the people I spoke to said something like ‘yeah, we have your press release in the queue and we'll have someone call you back tomorrow.’ We got pretty darn good coverage with six placements. It was definitely a good lesson in the power of moving quickly to respond to current events.”
Diane Goodwin is a principal at Movement Communications Academy, a communications training and consultancy.
