This is part 2 of a guest blog by Simon Carter, Head of Media Relations for the Scout Association. Read Part 1 here.

In January this year Scouting kicked off the centenary celebration of the Cub Scout section. Simon describes how the lessons learned from the 2007 centenary year have been adapted for the 2016 celebration.

simon carter photo part 2

This is a two-part blog designed to give you some practical ideas for planning the media coverage for your charity’s significant anniversary.

Part Two  – How to end on a high

Build on excellent local events

No matter how many events you plan nationally your local volunteers and supporters will create some fantastic events that are outstanding media opportunities. With 573,000 Members and nearly 24,000 local Sections that’s also true for the Scout Movement.

About six months ago one of our Scout Counties was organising a special take over day of Blackpool Pleasure beach in early February. It was a great opportunity as we did not have to organise the event nationally and it was organised in a very professional manner by our local teams. This meant we were able to generate some amazing live TV coverage on Sky News that day showing 7,000 Cubs Scouts on rollercoasters and having a ball.

To make sure we harness all these potential local stories we have specially designed part of our web site dedicated to making sure most of the locally organised events gets noticed and we can harness them to use as a comms vehicle.

Call in favours and give journalists a good time

We all have journalists who we work with who keep promising that they will work with us on a special event. Well a centenary is your hook to retell your organisation’s key story and to allow you to get your organisation’s messages out there. Offer journalists exclusives and get them involved in events. The ITV crew who attended the Zoo launch event had a great time. Penguins, aardvarks and children  – what’s not to like?

The next exciting adventure we have planned will be a tour of Cub Scout events across the UK in a helicopter. That will be an easy gig to sell into a journalist.

Harness your celebrity supporters

Every journalist loves a celebrity. You should ensure you get special video messages recorded by a key supporter(s). You should also ask them to appear at key events and to write special pieces for you to pitch into the media.

With so much of the media being celebrity led having one or more involved will make getting onto many shows in the ITV stable that much easier.

Here is our cubs100 celebrity Steve Backshall with his own video message.

We recorded loads more content with Steve one morning at a scout campsite in Kent last year so expect to see more from Steve as the year progresses.

Employ great people to capture images and video

We have been working with three great professionals for some years now (@martynphoto, @fluidHD &  @davebirdphoto) and they all know my organisation’s brand, our key messages and what works and does not work for our audiences. Having a few prepared packages of video that you can throw to a broadcaster really helps lift an interview and gets your messages across. We supplied content to ITV land that really helps the piece fly.

This is an example of some material we supplied to Channel Five TV that pushed home the point we are open to young people of all faiths and none and particularly welcome young women.

Make sure you have prepared crops of images and video available at short notice that shows your brand, you never know when you will need them. Carry them at all times on a portable hard drive or have them available on a Google drive so you can share them from any location!

Raid the archives

Spend a week or two working with the archives team to find out what you have that plays to your current messages and branding but adds breath and value to your pieces. The content we supplied to the BBC and ITV at the Cubs100 launch event was used in the opening pieces.

In looking we found some great images, video and text that described the way Cub Scouting was started in the middle of the Great War by a bunch of very focused and dedicated women. This story will be told in full later in the year but we found it inspiring and when its told in full will go a long way to bust the myth that Scouting is a male only movement. It was not all men when it started and is certainly not all men now.

End with a bang

In 20007 we ended the year with a massive event at the 02. It was a great event and a spectacular success but not very media friendly event so we missed out on an opportunity to shout our messages from the rooftops. This time we plan to do something bigger and more locally based so every community has their own story to tell and really help get us noticed. Watch out on the 16th December for our year ending finale.

And finally………..

Enjoy being part of a comms team in an anniversary year – It is a special experience. Make sure you savour every moment. I may be rather worn out by the end of the year but give me a couple of weeks off and will be keen to do it all over again during the next Scout anniversary…..I must talk to the archives team to find out when that is!

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