CILIPS conference

Taking national advocacy and making it local

27th October 2010

Agenda

• What do SLIC want to achieve?• The national campaign– Public affairs– Public relations

• What can you do locally?• Over to you!

What do SLIC want to achieve?

What do SLIC want to achieve?

• Create better understanding of the role of libraries in modern, civic Scotland

• Stop unnecessary cuts to services• Remind local and national politicians

of the value placed on libraries by their constituents

• Remind local politicians and civil servants of their statutory duties

How will this be done?

• A public affairs programme:– Local and national politicians

engagement

• A public relations programme:– Stakeholder engagement–Media relations

What is being done nationally?

Public Affairs

• Lobbying political parties to discuss their manifestos and inputting to these

• Writing and distributing a manifesto for libraries in Scotland

• Engaging with national politicians – Garden Lobby event

What is being done nationally?

Public Relations• Engaging with local authority decision makers• Engaging with other influencers, e.g. CoSLA,

UNISON• Speaking at relevant events & conferences• Developing a campaign to ensure national

and trade media coverage• Building a consumer campaign - ensure public

are supporting libraries at a grass roots level

Stakeholder engagement

Why are stakeholders important?

• They represent wider communities or interests

• Are decision makers

• Are opinion formers or opinion leaders

• Can be experts or enthusiasts

• Often feed the media

• Shape the environment within which you work

Who are stakeholders?

• Those individuals and organisations with a stake in your organisation’s success or failure

• For example:– local & national politicans– Civil servants/government departments– NGOs / NDPBs– high profile influencers and thought-leaders– decision-makers– trade & professional associations– consumer groups / pressure groups– charities / voluntary organisations

Who are not stakeholders?

• The general public – they are a target audience, a community, a market segment…..

– Parts of the public are influenced through the various bodies representing them

• Your own employees – they are your partners, your team……

• Not the media – they are a channel of communication…..

– Unless they shape opinion, e.g. specialists in their field

When do we turn to stakeholders?

• Problems in the media

• When a crisis hits

• As part of wider communications strategy

• Preparing the way for change…

Stakeholder mapping

• We typically map and prioritise stakeholders according to likely:– influence / power– awareness / interest in you– impact on your organisation's ability– credibility to engage

• This has to be reappraised on an annual basis as environmental factors can cause stakeholders to rise or lower in priority

Public Relations

What is PR?

You’re at a party and you see someone particularly attractive on the other side of the room. What do you do?

• If you walk straight up to them and tell them that you are extremely good looking, excellent company for an evening and pretty rich along with it - that’s advertising

• if you walk over, explain why you are the perfect partner for them for the evening and manage to convince them - that’s direct marketing

• if they walk over to you, tell you that they’ve heard how charming you are and they’ve been dying to meet you and please could they spend the evening - that’s public relations

Media relations

Ask yourself these questions:

• Who is your audience? • What do you want to tell them?

• What are you trying to

accomplish?

• What is your ideal headline?

The concept of “Newsworthiness”

“News” does not have a precise definitionEditors’ screening process to consider:

• Timeliness (relevant to media lead times)• Proximity (relevant to media’s ‘community’)• Consequence (affect the health, financial

well-being, social status or political future?)• Human interest angle

Engage with your local media

• Find out who cover areas where libraries could get involved, for example– Education– Enterprise– Jobs– Technology

• Arrange to meet the journalists to introduce yourself• Invite them to visit a local library on a day where

there is an activity going on, e.g. ITC taster session• Let them know any good news stories

What can you do at a local level?

Amplifying national activity locally

• Contribute to the debate at a local level• Map your stakeholders and meet with

them to ensure their support – arrange to meet local decision makers

• Look for local speaking / networking opportunities, e.g. chamber of commerce

• Publicise your successes in the local media • Distribute campaign materials

What should you say?

• Write your elevator speech• Prepare your pitch:–What have you done locally –What would you like to do?–What can the person you are talking to

do to help?

• Be clear about what you are asking them to do, e.g. publicly endorse your work, contact national politicians

The elevator pitch

An elevator pitch is an overview of your service and is designed to just get a conversation started

• Keep it short – around 200 to 250 words• Have a hook, e.g. an interesting statistic that you

can compare to something easy to understand • Make it clear – no acronyms or jargon• Ensure it is credible – how can you add value?• Practice so you remember it

Golley Slater elevator pitch

• Golley Slater Scotland is part of the wider Golley Slater marketing group, with offices across the UK

• We have around 350 people working with us

• We draw on a national pool of highly-skilled and talented people in Scotland and across the UK to deliver fantastic results locally

• We are experts in planning, PR, marketing, advertising, direct, recruitment advertising & contact management

• We build a bespoke team for our clients, based around their needs and requirements

• As one of the leading agencies in Scotland, we are proud to be chosen to be a supplier of the Scottish Government marketing services framework

• In fact we are the only agency in Scotland who is listed on advertising, PR and digital rosters.

• Our belief is none of us is as smart as all of us

Over to you

• At your tables – come up with a list of your local stakeholders - between eight and ten individuals or organisations

• On your own – write your elevator pitch

• 20 minutes for both exercises

Feedback

• One stakeholder per table – build a list you can take with you to get you started

• One elevator pitch at random from each table

The end

Any questions?