The Piggy-Back Principle
What a Ham, by Mostlysunny1 via flickr
A great nonprofit leader I know recently saw a cool online quiz that he could appropropriate for his own work, and his reaction was “Great. I love piggy backing.”
It occured to me how rarely I hear this.
In our sector, we tend to focus on how little we have and how much more we need. But we would need less if we got more creative about piggy backing - for example, aligning with an issue or news already getting a lot of attention, or riding a demographic trend, or using (with permission, of course) great content developed by other entities. Not much money for audience research? Read other research - or as my buddy Craig LeFebvre says, look at campaigns directed at your audience that work. (Not just those in your issue area—but those that target your audience. The underlying values and messaging could be piggy back material.)
In other words, never build when you can borrow.
Before you start from scratch on anything, spend an hour seeing what’s already there, what can help you and what stands in your way. Act accordingly.
Here are some marketplace forces - aka potential piggies - to get you started:
1. Is there a demographic, lifestyle, social, health, natural or economic trend that we can ride? What trends might bring attention to our cause?
2. Are laws or regs in place that could help us succeed?
3. Is there research being released that is attracting publicity and bolsters our case?
4. What’s got the eye of the media? Can we play off that story?
5. What companies benefit if we succeed? Can we co-opt them?
6. Who else is talking about our issue and how could they help influence our audiences?
7. What content or material has already been developed that we can use?
An example of piggy backing in my book is the Five a Day campaign. That highly successful campaign to get us eating more fruits and veggies piggy backed onto the increasing number of people overwhelmed by their busy lifestyles by packaging fruits and veggies so they were more easy and convenient to consume - the original fast food.
Another example is Network for Good’s own Learning Center. We didn’t start from scratch in creating a site with original articles - we feature the work of the many smart writers and bloggers who’ve already written great material.
The lesson? Piggy backing often makes us more effective. It’s not about scrimping and stealing. It’s about riding on the back of what has already been built and has momentum in the marketplace.
Syndicate
Hiya Katya!
This reminds me of a little project that I have going to generate material for press releases about our organization and local public health. I take an article or topic off the web and I send it to a group of local health directors and they have to come up with a “connection” to local public health and answer a series of questions:
What is the Public Health Message derived from these stories?
Is it Prevention, Promotion or Protection oriented? (These are the three overarching themes that we agreed to stick to, which are in line with national level campaigns)
How do we connect it to Local Health?
How do we “sell” this message to a:
General Audience
Youth Group
Older Group
Urban Audience
Rural Audience
Once we get the answers from them, we will write up a draft press release that can be sent by either the local health department or district that is “customized” to meet the needs of their particular target audience.
So far, it has generated so interesting responses as the topics don’t always have a direct reference to public health. For example, I gave them the topic of the recent downturn in the housing market and how increased foreclosure rates would affect local health departments...that REALLY got them thinking!