In today’s world, reputation is everything. It’s what people think about your organization - how it’s perceived and what emotions it elicits. It’s what they’ve heard about your nonprofit and what they haven’t heard.
An organization’s most valued asset is its reputation. What is its actual value? That’s hard to quantify; however, it’s safe to say that a strong reputation is often the difference between a nonprofit that can attract and retain employees, volunteers and funders, and one that can’t.
Reputation is your company’s greatest asset because it builds goodwill among your stakeholders, attracts top talent, helps you retain good employees, mitigates risk during crises and helps you earn loyalty.
Building or enhancing your reputation can be accomplished in a variety of ways. First, it’s in the quality of customer service you deliver – and that’s consistent service! It’s in the way you respond to and manage a crisis. It’s in the experience or reward that your donors or volunteers have when they get involved with your organization. And it’s in the day-to-day work experiences that your employees have. This doesn’t happen overnight. It evolves. It takes years and unfortunately, can be destroyed quickly. Just as increased market share and a solid balance sheet are no accident at a well-run corporation, a strong reputation is earned over time through a planned and managed effort.
Managing your media relations and public relations efforts is a great way to preserve, protect and enhance your reputation. You can protect your reputation by being prepared to successfully manage your messages during a crisis. One good idea is to take a media training course. One executive compared media training to learning how to golf correctly: it’s easier to take some lessons on proper technique, rather than trying to learn through trial and error. Another business leader said, “Trying to do media training during a crisis is like trying to learn how to fly a plane as it’s crashing.”
Presevering your reputation can be accomplished by building relationships with local media. Understand what their challenges are and help them do their job. For example, when a reporter calls seeking information, find out what their deadline is and meet it. Or, provide materials to the local media establishing you as the expert or trusted resource in your community on a particular issue (affordable housing trends, charitable giving patterns, etc.)
Ultimately, be prepared for ‘proactive’ media efforts which will help you enhance your reputation. Prep yourself to be a spokesperson for your cause or nonprofit or learn how to sell a story to the media about a service you offer or a client you have helped.
Much like a marketing plan, it makes sense to follow a process when you are launching a public relations effort. Set some goals: do you want to raise more money? Rally legislative support? Attract more volunteers?
Then take some time to understand what people think of your organization and its reputation – an informal ‘audit’ of sorts. Write down what you think your nonprofit’s reputation is, then ask stakeholders to describe the organization to you - how close is the public perception to what you think of your nonprofit?
Finally, develop a couple key messages and look for ways to incorporate them everywhere – at staff meetings, in your annual reports, community updates and media interviews. And remain consistent with your messaging. Hopefully, you are working off a strong foundation already and all you need to do is enhance and leverage the great reputations you already have in place.
A reputation is a lot like the movie “Field of Dreams” – if you build it, they will come.
Teresa Morrow, Director of Corporate Communications,
Bremer Financial Services
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