C06 Session: Collaborating with the Media

Collaborating with the Media: Guiding Nonprofits through the Process

Friday, August 4, 4:00pm - 5:30pm

Track:  Capacity Building Models and Strategies

Presenter

Sandra Beckwith, Beckwith Communications

Description

Publicity can generate the kind of media exposure that leads to donations, grants, volunteers, and social change. It can mean the difference between an organization that thrives and one that just gets by. Media outlets want to collaborate with nonprofit organizations to help them get that valuable and cost-effective publicity, but they need nonprofit groups to provide them with news and information that's relevant to their audiences.  Attend this session to learn about the tools, tactics, and knowledge you need when collaborating with the press to keep your name, issue, or messages front and center.

About the Presenter

Sandra Beckwith, Beckwith Communications

With more than 25 years of award-winning publicity experience, recovering publicist Sandra Beckwith now concentrates on helping organizations learn now to generate their own publicity. She is the author of "Publicity for Nonprofits: Generating Media Exposure that Leads to Awareness, Growth, and Contributions" (Dearborn Trade, June 2006) and "Streetwise Complete Publicity Plans: How to Create Publicity That Will Spark Media Exposure and Excitement" (Adams Media 2003). She has received several national and regional awards for publicity excellence, including the coveted Silver Anvil from the Public Relations Society of America (PRSA), and is the youngest and first female recipient of the Sharleen M. Bruse Memorial Award for lifetime achievement from PRSA's Rochester Chapter.

Her nonprofit experience includes eight years as a freelance communications team member with a national nonprofit organization funded by The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, leading a publicity workshop for several of the Foundation's grantees, writing a quarterly "how to" media relations newsletter for a national network of nonprofit organizations, and publicizing a local conference on palliative care.
 
Self-employed since 1985, Sandra's earlier experience includes positions at an educational publishing firm near Madison, Wisc.; Burson-Marsteller/Chicago, one of the world's largest public relations firms; and the former Heublein Inc. in Hartford, Conn., a beverage alcohol distiller/marketer. She has a degree in journalism and public relations from Utica College of Syracuse University; is a past contributing editor of three trade journals; and is a member of the American Society of Journalists and Authors, the American Society of Business Publication Editors, and the Public Relations Society of America. She speaks often on three subject areas (publicity, gender differences, and finding the courage to change) and writes regularly on a range of topics for a variety of national magazines and newsletters.