Creating a communications plan for an 80 million capital campaign, taught me a few things that I still use today. The biggest lesson I learned is that the bigger the initiative, the simpler the story needs to be. An 80 million campaign may be the goal, but the story behind the message is really important to building a strong campaign case, so the audience knows what their gift will change, who will benefit, and why. Whether you're communicating a large fundraising campaign, organizational change, or a new strategic direction, the point remains the same. Clarity creates connection.
These are the lessons that I learned from my experience that I still use today. First things first, focus on the story, not the deliverables. It's easy to go straight to what you need to produce: campaign materials, website, videos, presentations, donor stewardship, events, etc., but before you produce anything, ask yourself these three questions: What are we trying to make possible? Why does it matter now? Why should our audience care? If you can't answer those questions, producing more content won't make your audience any clearer.
Developing a simple narrative that anyone can understand and repeat is the best way to develop a capital campaign. I would recommend that you develop a communications plan that can take your institutional language and translate it to human language. Organizations tend to talk about themselves in organizational terms: strategic priorities, facilities, programs, endowments, long-term goals, etc., but your audience doesn't. Your audience wants to know: What will this campaign actually change?
Instead of communicating that you're building a new facility, tell your audience what that new facility will be able to do in service to your target audience that it can't currently. Instead of communicating that you're growing a program, tell your audience who will now have access to opportunities that they didn't have before. Every big campaign priority should tie back to a tangible human outcome. Big campaigns tend to make big promises, but what people want is proof, not promises. Strong campaign communications should be aspirational and anecdotal. Gathering a portfolio of stories that include outcomes, data points, quotes, student or community stories, organizational history, or an example of what other investments have made possible are proof points to support your overall narrative. Being specific is the most compelling way to go when telling your campaign stories, and adding flowery language to make your campaign feel grander than it is will be a futile task.
Pro tip: The communications team should be seated at the table with leadership, advancement, and any others who are builders from the beginning. It's more productive to have communications involved in the conversation, not just to charge them with announcing the results. When communications teams are involved from the beginning, it allows them to dissect the strategy and ask questions about audience, perception, timing, concerns, and messaging. Those questions may reveal gaps that can be worked through to help fortify the strategy before any final decisions are made.
Plan for a long game. A multi-million-dollar campaign has a series of stories that are relevant through the various phases and milestones. You need a narrative that can tell meaningful stories over time, so you create a communications plan that maps out opportunities for donor stories, impact stories, leadership perspectives, community voices, progress updates, and special moments. Be sure to plan for the unexpected. Not every good story will land with your target audience the way you'd like, so you need to have plans in place that can help to mitigate those roadblocks!
Working on a campaign on this level confirmed something that I've believed about communications all along: communications, when done correctly, make things easier to understand and make people want to pay attention. As a communications team, your role isn't to say everything all the time, but to ask what people need to know and why they should care. Once you've answered those questions, the rest of the communications work gets a whole lot easier!
Is your campaign telling the right story? A fundraising campaign is not only about raising a certain amount of money, it’s also about what you are raising it for and the impact it will make, so your story should be just as solid as your strategy. If you are planning a capital campaign, starting up a big fundraiser, or just need help with messaging for your organization, let's talk. I can help you create a meaningful communications strategy to further connect your mission and audience and encourage impactful support.
