Grassroots Advocacy Old Tactics

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Grassroots Advocacy Old Tactics New Tools

• NACHC 2008 Policy Issues Forum
• October 26, 2009
• Presented by
• Marc Wetherhorn
• National Advocacy Director
• National Association of Community Health Centers

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Power concedes nothing without a demand. It
never did and it never will.
Frederick Douglass

• REAL POWER IS MEASURED BY THE BATTLES WE DONT
  HAVE TO FIGHT.

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Effective Advocacy POWER

• Grassroots advocacy is about one thing building
  Power.
• Power is not measured by the number of advocates
  we have on a list.
• Power is not measured by the number of small (or
  even large) victories we win every now and then.
• Power must be measured by our ability to
  successfully advance our own agenda and to make
  it unthinkable that any other political or
  special interest would ever want to take us on.

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Grassroots Advocacy 101

• THE BASICS
• Know What You Want
• Know who can give it to you
• Know what they want
• Know how to make the loudest squeak
• Advocacy is an ongoing effort
• KEYS TO SUCCESSFUL ADVOCACY
• Grassroots Advocacy is a Competitive Activity
• There are winners and losers and, sometimes a
  stalemate is a win!
• Advocacy an ACTIVE process, not a passive one
• You are not the only one who wants something so
  you have to be heard through the din of all the
  other interests.

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Relative Effectiveness of Advocacy Communications

• 1. A visit to your health center
• 2. A personal meeting back home
• 3. A personal meeting in Washington
• 4. Personal telephone calls
• 5. Personalized Letters (faxed)
• 6. Personalized emails
• 7. Template emails (ineffective unless in
• volume)

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Rules for Organizing Grassroots Advocacy at a
Health Center

• 1. Advocacy Has to be an Organizational
  Commitment
• The Board Must Take the Lead a formal
  commitment to time
• and resources is essential.
• Create an Advocacy Committee with a Chair
  Board and staff
• need to be included
• 2. Advocacy Has Rules
• Know the Rules. Its hard to break the rules,
  but you can do it
• if you dont know what they are
• 3. Advocacy Needs to be done Face to Face
• Plan to get your local, state and federal
  officials (and their staff) to your Center on a
  regular basis

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Rules for Organizing Grassroots Advocacy at a
Health Center

• 4. Advocacy Needs Numbers
• If 100 emails and faxes are good, a thousand
  is better!
• (It took 1 million emails to save Big Bird!)
• 5. Advocacy Needs a Megaphone
• Learn how to use the media
• 6. Advocacy Needs Friends
• Look for ways to reach out to other
  organizations in your community on a regular
  basis
• 7. Advocacy Needs Votes
• Empower your health center by making sure your
  patients and staff are registered to vote and
  that they vote!
• 8. Advocacy Doesnt Stop When the Whistle Blows
• When it comes to the government, issues dont go
  away they just hide.
• Your goal is to build the permanent power to
  influence any issue that affects your center- at
  any level of government.

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New Tools for Finding Friends and Building
NumbersSocial Networking Facebook and Twitter

• What is social networking?
• A social network service focuses on building
  online communities of people who share interests
  and/or activities...
• While it could be said that email and websites
  have most of the essential elements of social
  network services, the idea of proprietary
  encapsulated services has gained popular
  uptake...
• The main types of social networking services are
  those which contain category divisions (such as
  former school-year or classmates), means to
  connect with friends (usually with
  self-description pages) and a recommendation
  system linked to trust.

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The Basics

• What is Facebook?
• Facebook is one vehicle for social networking.
• Its a free-access social networking site in
  which users can join networks organized by city,
  workplace, school and region to connect and
  interact with other people.
• Health centers can also have fans and send them
  messages, and update their organizational
  profiles to notify fans about themselves.

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The Basics

• What is Twitter?
• Twitter is a free social networking and
  micro-blogging service that enables its users to
  send and read other users updates, known as
  tweets.
• Tweets are text-based posts of up to 140
  characters in length.
• For health centers, Twitter can be a tool for
  connecting to the community, the local media and
  your elected officials.

Source Wikipedia
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The Basics

• Why are we talking about them?
• Facebook has become an essential communications
  tool. It is the third-largest website in the
  world the largest one where you can control your
  presence (Google and Yahoo are 1 and 2).
  Twitter is gaining.
• No excusesEASY HUGE (and unlike fax machines)
  FREE!
• Not counting labor but the amount of time
  spent maintaining a Facebook presence is
  completely up to the health center

Source Alexa
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Getting Started

• Signing up
• www.facebook.com for Facebook
• www.twitter.com for Twitter
• Facebook requires name, e-mail address, gender
  and birthday (to verify youre over 13 does not
  have to be public) set up your personal account
  first, set up your health centers presence later
• Twitter requires name, username that you choose
  and e-mail address you must set up
  organizational and personal accounts separately

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Getting Started

• Getting your bearings Twitter
• Eventually youll have to get to know the
  language of Twitter, which is imposed by the
  140-character limit.
• Example RT re-tweet meaning that youre
  sharing with your friends/followers something
  that you saw from someone else.
• Example fqhc People use hashtags, or
  abbreviates preceded by , to mark topics.
  Health center folks have taken to usign fqhc.
• Best way to learn is to watch for a few days.

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Getting Started

• Getting your bearings Twitter
• Eventually youll have to get to know the
  language of Twitter, which is imposed by the
  140-character limit.
• Example RT re-tweet meaning that youre
  sharing with your friends/followers something
  that you saw from someone else.
• Example fqhc People use hashtags, or
  abbreviates preceded by , to mark topics.
  Health center folks have taken to usign fqhc.
• Best way to learn is to watch for a few days.

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Uses

• Facebook is ALSO good for
• INTERACTIVITY.
• Discussions
• Photos
• Professional networking
• Links between like-minded organizations

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Uses

• Twitter is good for
• Most of what Facebook is good for.
• Announcing job openings.
• Putting your message in front of local elected
  officials and reporters who are tweeting.
• Establishing relationships with reporters and
  others in your community.

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Context and Final Thoughts

• Health centers should not (yet, anyway) abandon
  other forms of outreach in favor of Facebook and
  Twitter.
• At this point, Facebook and Twitter are seen as
  critical additional arrows in the public
  relations and advocacy quivers.
• You should still be making use of traditional
  news releases, newsletters, waiting room bulletin
  boards, phone calls, e-mails all of the tools
  that have been successful for you in recent years.

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Context and Final Thoughts

• Speaking of old vs. new tools dont forget to
  cross-promote!
• If you generate new original content for Facebook
  and Twitter, cross-promote your traditional
  content for example, tweeting about the
  latest press release or newsletter you just sent
  out.
• Make sure that your old media makes mention of
  your new activities. Your hard-copy newsletters
  and e-mail signatures should mention your
  Facebook and Twitter presences your websites
  front page should include links to them etc.

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The only way to predict the future is to have
power to shape the future. -- Eric Hoffer
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• ULTIMATELY
• Leadership determines the advocacy culture.
• Culture determines behavior
• Behavior (actions vs. banners in the hall")
  determines
• Grassroots Participation
• POWER