Build an army of advocates

Advocates (or activists, depending on your organization) form a powerful army to show support for your organization en masse.  Here are three ways to cultivate advocates:

In person: Gather emails and phone numbers from every person who shows an interest in your organization (clients, volunteers, donors, service providers, etc.). Your organization should have a routine sign-in form or business card exchange before meetings or other work, and each person should be added to your advocate list. 

Via the web:  Every organization’s website should include a way for people to sign up for more information. A simple web form that asks for emails, addresses, and telephone numbers will suffice.  Also, every organization should have a Facebook page and push those you come in contact with to “Like” it. 

The Nature Conservancy has a great link to sign up for email updates right on its homepage. 

Once you have advocates, what do you do with them? You should regularly send electronic newsletters that update them on the organization’s overall progress.  Monthly or weekly emails provide a good frequency. Any more and you border on spam; any less and people forget you exist. 

Paying for email marketing services is worth the investment.  Companies like RTP-based iContact can help you easily design and send attractive messages to your advocates and track how effective they are. I have also used MailChimp, Constant Contact, and Convio. 

Action alerts are special emails or social media posts that ask your advocates to influence public policy by doing something.  You explain the situation and can ask people to show up to a meeting or event, but most likely, you ask them to email and call elected officials.  

The Latin American Coalition has a good example via Facebook, and PETA provides another example on the local level. 

Some organizations invest in software like Roll Call's CapWiz or Convio’s Advocacy Tool to manage action alerts. These allow your advocates to read your action alert, write an email, and send it to elected officials all on one web page.  

The North Carolina Conservation Network has a good example using Convio.

We will spend more time on action alerts during a more detailed discussion on communications for advocacy.

Identify good surrogates for your organization

Non-profit executive directors usually handle meetings with elected officials, but including strong surrogates will help you deliver the message. Elected officials are more likely to take a meeting request from someone "important" than a non-profit staffer. Surrogates need to be respected members of the community and have name recognition.

Good surrogates include:

• Your board chair
• Other influential board members
• Your largest donors
• Local business leaders
• Influential supporters like local or state celebrities
• Other elected officials (we'll call them "champions" in later posts)

The Conservation Trust for North Carolina, on whose board I sit, lobbied the North Carolina General Assembly to restore funding to the Clean Water Management Trust Fund. CTNC sent three people to lobby the legislature:  the executive director, the board chair, and Eric Montross, a board member and UNC basketball standout from the 1990s. Legislators were eager to meet with Eric and restored $1.5 million to the trust fund.

If you can't think of people who fit this bill, invest time in finding surrogates for your organization. Consider adding influential people to your board or even developing an honorary board of local and state celebrities. Also, talk with you donors about your government relations needs and cultivate them as potential surrogates.

You may want to consider organizing a Government Relations Committee for your board to follow the legislative process and serve as formal surrogates for the organization.

Build a case statement for government relations

To recap what we shared yesterday, a concise, well-written case statement allows elected officials to understand what your organization does and what you need from them. This is different than a longer case statement that you would prepare for a capital campaign; it's just a simple, up-front statement of why you need to talk to elected officials.

A good case statement for government relations will include:

• What you need from the elected official
• What your organization does
• Who it impacts
• Where your work is 
• Why your work is important
• Why your work is unique
• How long you have been working

The best case statements also include:

• The organization’s value to the state/county/city
• Consequences of the requested action
• Metrics quantifying the organization’s work
• How funding is used

You’re developing language for a business document, so a case statement is not the place for:

• Rote statements of misson, vision, and values
• Waxing poetic about your cause
• Anecdotes and personal stories (this comes later in your government relations planning)

A written case statement should be no longer than a few paragraphs and able to be easily inserted into letters or memos. If verbalized, it should be like a “30 second elevator speech.”

Here's an example for a fictitious organization:

Please protect water quality for 15,000 residents by voting to fully fund the Sucarnooche River Society. Since 1981, we have protected 1,000+ acres of land around the Sucarnooche, Sumter County’s main water source, resulting in cleaner drinking water for residents and fewer environmental interventions by state government. Our state appropriation directly funds land acquisition around the river and education programs that help 1,000 residents, farmers, and construction companies each year. 

What's the case for your organization?

Building a foundation for advocacy work

Before launching a government relations program, an organization needs three things: a legislative liaison, a strong case statement, respected surrogates and advocates.

Legislative liaison: Your organization needs to designate a person to manage the government relations process. Many organizations hire a director of advocacy or government relations to manage this, but the duties can also be assigned to the executive director, development director, or other staffers. In smaller organizations, a board member may be designated to manage the process.


Case statement: A concise, well-written case allows elected officials to understand what your organization does and what you need from them. Concise delivery is key. Elected officials sift through mountains of paperwork and have hundreds of conversations each day. You need a clear one-pager and a pre-rehearsed "30 second commercial" that makes your case.

Surrogates: Good surrogates help carry your message. They are well-respected within your community and carry political clout. Examples may include your board chair, a large donor, respected business supporters, or other elected officials.

Advocates: Also known as activists, they believe in your organization and can show their support en masse. They read your action alerts and, if you ask them, flood government offices with phone calls and emails. They show up to government meetings to show support or even to protest.

Without all three of these, your government relations efforts will likely fail. Stay tuned for detailed explanations on each.