Photo courtesy of Red Media Group, Flickr, Creative Commons

When I work with nonprofit leaders who are preparing for media  interviews, one of my first pieces of advice is, “Remember, you’re in control!” The media needs your help to tell the story, and you’re the expert on your organization’s issues. So, if that’s the case, why do we find ourselves floundering in media interviews, being dragged off topic with no sense of how to bring it back to our core messages? It’s because most of us just need a little practice. We need to sharpen our interview skills, and learn some easy tricks to maintain control and stay on message.

If you’re looking for an affordable, efficient way to brush up on your spokesperson skills, sign up for our Spokesperson Superstar webinar on Feb. 23.  Learn interview performance tips like “bridging” and “flagging.” Find out what to wear on camera, and get advice on how to prepare. You’ll also have the opportunity to participate in a mock interview during the session.

You can also check out the Workshop’s “11 tips for broadcast interviews.” We hope to see you on the webinar!

The Local Reporting Initiative was launched in the Spring of 2011 to report stories about Chicago’s South and West Sides that aren’t often told. With support from The Chicago Community Trust, the Community Media Workshop has been overseeing the project, and we’ve been blown away by some of the stories produced under the Initiative. These are stories about real people, stories that deserve to be heard.

Take Nina, the first woman to go through a new program to help women facing prostitution charges in Cook County.

Or Aurora, an undocumented youth who works two jobs and desperately wants to go back to school.

There’s Justin, the teenage kid of a hardworking single mom who tries to find his way in Auburn Gresham.

And Linda, a woman with polio who is a Domestic Violence Coordinator and was once a victim of domestic violence herself.

These are real people living in our city, and these are just a few of the amazing stories told through the Local Reporting Initiative.

Why aren’t their stories told more often? Why don’t we see these issues covered on TV or in the daily newspapers? Tell us what you think.

If you’d like to read more, check out the Local Reporting blog.

A 2011 story by Barrington Patch about CareerPlace

At a time of record unemployment in Illinois and the country, organizations that can help people find employment and build their skills are more important then ever. Yet, CareerPlace, located in Barrington, found that more than 40% of people in their area didn’t know about their services and classes for unemployed individuals.

“We struggled with finding the time to reach out to the local media,” said Monica Keane, executive director of CareerPlace. “I thought Professional Media Relations would be a good way to learn how to get information to the public.”

After attending the Community Media Workshop’s Professional Media Relations course in early 2011, Keane said she realized that when working with the media, everything is about a story.

“I learned to stop telling the business of the agency and to tell the story of the people who are touched by what we do,” said Keane.

Since the Workshop course, CareerPlace has received more media coverage in community press (check out the Patch story here) and started developing relationships with local reporters. Keane says she can now pick up the phone and call certain reporters with possible story ideas. She’s also used the Workshop’s online press release generator and Chicago area media guide to aid in her media outreach work.

“I’m just really impressed with the Workshop,” said Keane. “The willingness of staff to roll up their sleeves and get involved with the nonprofits they serve is so important.”

Keane enjoyed her time at the Workshop so much that she decided to hire Workshop staff for a custom consulting project—development of a train-the-trainer curriculum “Using Social Media to Search, Network and Find Your Next Job” to give CareerPlace trainers tools to help job seekers use social media in their employment searches. The project was supported with a grant from the Barrington Area Community Foundation.

The Workshop team continues to work with CareerPlace to ensure successful social media trainings for its participants in the coming year.

The Workshop’s 2012 Professional Media Relations course starts Jan. 20. There are still spots available. Register today and start making your own local media connections!

The Top 11

1. NP Communicator: Be a nonprofit blogger! - By far, our most popular blog post this year. It’s a helpful post, and it just goes to show, you never know what may go viral.

2. Newstips: Library cuts and TIF surpluses – Newstips posts that related to TIFs were very popular this year. It’s an issue to continue watching in Chicago.

3. Newstips: On TIF reform, Bronzeville has ideas

4. Newstips: Fact check: Emanuel, Brizard, Pritzker

5. Newstips: On Whittier, the Tribune is duped

6. Chicago is the World: We Are Not Alone - Led by Steve Franklin at the Workshop, this campaign to bridge divides and fight violence in Chicago’s Latino and African-American communities has gained steam in 2011. Check out related stories and posts at Chicago is the World.

7. Newstips: A curious case: Avondale and Logandale

8. NP Communicator: Seven tips to pitch your story by phone

9. NP Communicator: An essential resource for every Chicago nonprofit and grassroots group…download it here – If you haven’t downloaded our 2012 Media Event Quick Contact sheet yet, you should do it now! It includes contact information for all of the major news outlets in Chicago, and it’s free.

10. Chicago is the World: Adventures in Multicultural Living: Bollywood flash mob dance performance surprises Ann Arbor Summer Festival

11. NP Communicator: Seven tips to building and maintaining your media list

We hope you had a great 2011 and enjoy an even better 2012. Happy holidays everyone!

RoiAnn Phillips of HealthConnect One

RoiAnn Phillips decided to attend Professional Media Relations because she wanted a better grasp of media strategy and outreach as she took on more communications work at HealthConnect One.

Her “ah-ha moment” came when instructors told the class how to tailor a pitch to pique reporters’ interest, but her big breakthrough came a couple of weeks later. During the five-part workshop, she was able to pitch her organization’s upcoming report analyzing breastfeeding rates in Illinois to WBEZ Reporter Chip Mitchell. That opportunity resulted in three stories (below) in the coming months about the report and HealthConnect One. One hospital even decided to step up its breastfeeding efforts after hearing one of Mitchell’s stories on WBEZ.

“The WBEZ stories wouldn’t have happened if I hadn’t taken Professional Media Relations,” said Phillips. “Without the class, I wouldn’t have understood how to frame a pitch and I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to be in the room with reporters.”

REGISTER FOR PROFESSIONAL MEDIA RELATIONS TODAY.

Check out the WBEZ stories that resulted from RoiAnn’s time at Professional Media Relations and follow-up work with reporter Chip Mitchell.

Report: Breastfeeding in Illinois hinges partly on race, income – April 26, 2011

Hospital regulators let formula vie with breast milk – May 5, 2011

After WBEZ report, hospital steps up breastfeeding efforts – August 2, 2011

Professional Media Relations
$395 for the five-part media workshop
Starts Jan. 20, 2012
Includes numerous handouts, worksheets & a copy of the 2012 Getting On Air, Online & Into Print media guide ($125 annual subscription value).
Reserve your spot today.

Visit our website or call 312-369-6400.

Press release generator. Interested in creating a press release about your issue or campaign? Check out our press release generator to help you get started.

Media Event Quick Contact List. Looking for the most up-to-date quick contact list of assignment desks and editors at Chicago’s major media outlets? Download the 2012 Media Event Quick Contact List.

Community Calendars. If you have an event coming up that you want listed in Chicago media calendars, check out this resource to see a comprehensive list of calendars and links where you can submit your information.

Submit to Newstips. Newstips is the Workshop’s blog that distributes news tip information, submitted by hundreds of nonprofits across Chicago, to more than 500 journalists. Email Newstips Editor Curtis Black at curtis@newstips.org with your story ideas.

Tip sheets, worksheets and up-to-date information about the shifting media landscape. We’re constantly publishing new tips and tools for nonprofit communicators such as how to set up your organization’s Google+ page or tips for building and maintaining your media list. Subscribe to our bi-weekly electronic newsletter or visit the NP Communicator blog weekly to see what’s new.

And don’t forget about Chicago’s most comprehensive media guide, Getting On Air, Online & Into Print. If you want contact information for thousands of Chicago-area and Midwest media outlets and reporters, subscribe to our 2012 media guide. Now in print and online.

If you’re interested in registering for scheduled trainings, visit our training page to check out what’s coming up. At the beginning of 2012 we’ll be offering Professional Media Relations, a five-part course that culminates with nonprofits pitching their stories to reporters face-to-face. For the first time ever, we’re also offering an intensive Social Media Bootcamp where attendees will walk away with an online communications strategy and social media policy for their organizations.

If you prefer a custom training for your organization or one-on-one consulting, contact me at nora@newstips.org or 773/510-4819. You can read more about two of the organizations we’ve recently provided one-one-one communications assistance to–Investing In Communities and LISC’s Smart Communities Program–at the NP Communicator blog.

Let us know if there are other resources you’d like to see on our website or training topics you hope we cover in the future. We want to hear from you!

Michael Pink (left), principal of MAP Real Estate, and Bill Lowry (right) of The Chicago Community Trust, award $10,000 to nonprofit Community Shares

Over 150 members of Chicago’s nonprofit and business communities turned out on October 25^th to celebrate a new kind of philanthropy. Two socially responsible Chicago institutions–Urban Partnership Bank and the social enterprise Investing In Communities–teamed up, one as event host and one as donor, to give $42,000 to nonprofits.

The $42,000 in funds resulted from a real estate transaction between an established commercial real estate firm, MAP Real Estate, and Urban Partnership Bank (UPB), a new FDIC-insured community bank and certified Community Development Financial Institution. Investing In Communities (IIC) enables individuals and businesses to connect with socially conscious real estate professionals and generate free funding for their favorite nonprofits.  As an IIC Member, MAP Real Estate’s principal Michael Pink committed 15 percent of the commission he earned representing UPB in a lease transaction for donation, through IIC, to other nonprofits. Through IIC, this ordinary brokered transaction became a philanthropic event that generated unrestricted funding for 15 nonprofit beneficiaries.

The Workshop was proud to be a part of this exciting philanthropic event, working with the two organizations this year to spread the word about the new model and plan the event, and we want to congratulate the winning nonprofits. We would also like to thank special guest Bill Lowry of The Chicago Community Trust for joining us at the event and assisting with the drawing.

One $10,000 Award to: Community Shares of Illinois

Three $5,000 awards to: Dreams For Kids; Play For Life International; and Thousand Waves

Four $2,500 awards to: Centro San Bonifacio; Chicago Bilingual Nurse Consortium; Illinois Maternal and Child Health Coalition; and PAWS Chicago

Seven $1,000 awards to: Bear Necessities Pediatric Cancer Foundation; Changing Worlds; Donors Forum; Gnosis, Ltd.; KIPP Chicago; Opportunity Works Connecticut, Inc.; and Science Olympiad

“Attorneys, bankers, doctors—these professionals all have mechanisms in place through pro bono work or the Community Reinvestment Act or foundations that support their profession in giving back to the nonprofit community,” says Pink. “Investing In Communities enables real estate professionals to do that in a way that also makes them more attractive to potential clients.”

Since making its first distribution in May 2010, Investing In Communities has distributed more than $104,000 to nonprofits including Women Employed, Health and Medicine Policy Research Group, Children’s Memorial Hospital Foundation, and the Family Defense Center.

If you’re a nonprofit and you’re interested in becoming eligible for these types of funds in the future, learn more about becoming a Partner of Investing In Communities.

The Workshop is now on Google+, are you? Google+ (beta) has been up for some time now with a lot of us asking questions regarding it’s practical use to further reach out and engage with audiences. For nonprofits, the opportunity to directly engage with our audiences jumped one step further. Just the other day, the search giant announced the ability for organizations, businesses, nonprofits and more to create their own Brand Page.

If you are looking to get started with creating a Brand Page on Google+, we recommend checking out (former Making Media Connections Conference keynote) Heather Mansfield’s great post on how to get set up. If your shop is already up and running or if you are on Google+, add us to your circles. We’ll be experimenting with our page and keep you posted here on the npcommunicator blog or follow us on Twitter!

The Community Media Workshop on Google+

When I was a communications staff for a regional nonprofit organization here in Chicago over 10 years ago, I spent plenty of time calling and faxing city news desks and assignment desks very early in the day of an event or press conference to ensure that we were included in their agenda. Through this on-going communication and development of relationships with assignment desk editors I found out what times they were meeting, what information they needed and exactly who would be possibly covering our story or event. This practice got us coverage, helped expand our relationships with the media and pushed our mission forward to the public.

This practice started with one essential resource that I obtained for free at the Community Media Workshop–the Media Event Quick Contact Sheet.

This contact sheet lists the phone numbers, fax lines and emails of Chicago’s major daily newspapers and broadcast stations and has been published through the Workshop’s annual Getting On Air, Online & Into Print media guide for over 20 years. Find out more about the media guide, gain tips and download the 2012 Contact Sheet and other sample pages here for free.

You might also want to check out the Workshop’s online version of the media guide at www.chicagomediaguide.org or sign up for one of our upcoming communications training sessions. If you need help with creating a press alert, use our free generator.

If you think there is a communications resource we should research and create for the public, let us know. Feel free to comment below.

Happy communicating!

A screen shot of part of the Workshop's Hootsuite dashboard. Hootsuite is a great tool to use to manage social media in your office.

After conducting some communications trainings in Minnesota and Indiana for LISC’s Institute for Comprehensive Community Development, I was interviewed by one of their writers about social media. One article addresses a question I hear all the time from people we work with, “Why Tweet?” I offer my thoughts on why it’s useful and how to get started.

The second article is six basic tips for using social media in your work. There’s also a list of useful social media resources at the bottom that you may want to check out.

If you’re still looking for more advice on getting started or improving your social media strategy, attend one of our upcoming trainings. I’ll be leading a Social Media Basics webinar on Nov. 1, and the Workshop is offering an intermediate social media training on Nov. 10 with popular trainer Adam Thurman of Mission Paradox.

If you’d like a custom social media training for your organization, just email me at nora@newstips.org

Happy tweeting!