Articles & White Papers

8/24/2009

Newsletters perform vital role in advancement

Many organizations realize the importance of presenting advancement as a seamless and coordinated function between various departments. In AAI’s opinion, one person who understands and effectively applies this principle is Andrew Gerber, public relations coordinator at Gateway Woods Apostolic Christian Children’s Home (Leo, IN). Gerber is responsible for compiling Gateway’s newsletter (The Gate Post) and e-newsletter (E-Post) and takes very seriously their roles in supporting Gateway’s overall advancement efforts. AAI Communications Associate Sherilyn Ortman recently visited with Gerber about his philosophy and approach.

SO: How often do you publish The Gate Post and what is its format?
AG: We just increased the frequency of The Gate Post from three to four times per year. We made that change because in the winter our funding has traditionally dried up a bit and we thought we needed that extra communication with our constituents around February. The length is typically four or eight pages and is very flexible depending on the focus of the issue.

SO: How do you determine the content of each issue?
AG: The theme comes from a communications plan we created with AAI’s help. The plan lays out each issue for the next one or two years. In every issue we try to include a report from the administrator—usually his article is a nice introduction to the theme. Otherwise, the content varies quite a bit.

Because we’re in the middle of a [fundraising] initiative, we wanted to keep that and the The Gate Post issues compatible. This year we want to remind people of our mission and make them aware of some potential changes in state funding that could affect us, more or less to prepare them for the public phase of the Promise Fund initiative.

Even though our supporters know us well, many still think of us primarily as a children’s home. In a typical year, I try to constantly remind readers that we have five distinct programs by giving good representation to each on an alternating basis. So in summer I might have a foster care article and a houseparent article. Then in winter we try to include an adoption article.

SO: Talk a bit about the process of compiling the newsletter.
AG: Every time I go to create a The Gate Post it’s all laid out in the communications plan—topics, a list of articles, exactly what I need. That saves me an immense amount of time. I can quickly go down the list and identify someone that I can ask to write each piece. I always prefer to have other people write the articles because I feel like the people that are “in the trenches” of those various programs know a lot more about the work than I do. And because we frequently hear that people want to keep hearing more stories about the changed lives of residents, I always try to include a story or testimonial by a resident.

SO: How do you see The Gate Post as a vehicle for advancement?
AG: As is true of any organization, if you don’t keep your name in front of your supporters, they won’t know your current needs, they won’t be able to actively advocate for you, and they’ll lose interest. It seems redundant sometimes but it’s amazing how quickly people lose sight of what you’re about.

I see The Gate Post as a great way to keep tugging at people’s hearts, to encourage them to be active, to persuade them that their help is critical to our long term sustainability, to explain to them how they are helping us out and to thank them.

SO: You recently launched an e-newsletter, E-Post. What prompted that and what is its relationship to The Gate Post?
AG: For convenience sake, we plan to send the E-Post out each time we send a The Gate Post. I put the E-Post together during the two weeks that the The Gate Post is at the printer. The content is largely the same: I keep the administrator’s report full length but abbreviate the rest of the articles and then link to our website, www.gatewaywoods.org. Our goal is to constantly drive people to our website so they check out other things once they’re there. We try to make The Gate Post as available as possible by also making it downloadable from the website.

SO: What do you see happening with these publications in the future?
AG: Since I’ve started working here I’ve realized the importance of constantly reminding people of the scope of services we offer, so I don’t think we’ll change the frequency or the format anytime soon. The availability and convenience of E-Post is very nice. If I had the content to warrant it—a big announcement of some kind—I could always send out an extra E-Post for no additional cost since we’re paying a monthly subscription [to our distribution service] anyway. But I also continue to see the value of the The Gate Post since not everyone uses the internet. We currently have approximately 12,200 addresses on our mailing list and only about 4000 email addresses.

I recently attended a very interesting seminar about blogging, facebook, twitter, and other forms of social media. That presenter claims that, if you don’t take advantage of these social media, your other advertising will become obsolete. So in addition to continuing to use traditional media, in fall Gateway plans to delve into how we can start to use social media.

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