This week’s SoroptiVoice comes from Sue Tonks, from SI Bolton in Lancashire,
England. She has been a
Soroptimist for 3 years. Her club have developed and run many events
in their home town, to help other organisations, spread education and information and
promote Soroptimism. The event Sue describes below is a great example of event organisation and a fantastic profile raiser for Soroptimist International in the community! These steps could work anywhere…
I am writing about a major project which we delivered in
2010 called “Helping Bolton To Help Itself”. We felt
that many small volunteer groups in our area, who provide valuable services to
the community, were not able to promote their work due to lack of funds and
resources. So we wanted to create an
event where the people of Bolton could see what fabulous
work was being undertaken by the “quiet few” and at the same time put SI Bolton
on the map for the work it does in our local community and beyond.
Many large voluntary groups have the resources for extensive campaigns, have major backing
from industry and commerce, and can employ people to raise money and awareness
of their cause. However, many of the
smaller voluntary groups are founded by dedicated people who work tirelessly for a cause or provide a much needed service in the community, but have
little funds, PR knowledge or media status to get their message delivered. (Photo above, SI Bolton planning meeting). Here is the story of our big event, its planning, funding,
organisation and evaluation – our story.
We began planning our event “HELPING BOLTON TO HELP ITSELF” with three objectives/aims in mind:
- Increasing the awareness of the smaller
volunteer groups in the Bolton area - Increasing awareness of Soroptimism and SI
Bolton through publicity - Increasing the awareness of Soroptimism and SI
Bolton through its direct activities
The key aim of the club for 2010 – 2011 was to “increase
the overall awareness of Soroptimism, raise local awareness and the profile of
SI Bolton in the community and to increase its membership as a result” . The event was to take place on May 22 2010, so with that deadline in mind we
began the awareness and publicity campaign in February 2010 as a specific four phased media "attack"!
PHASE ONE – The Search for Volunteer Groups
February to March 2010: We met with management and members of CVS
(Community & Voluntary Services) and sought their assistance in attracting
voluntary groups to attend the event. They
issued e-mails to all voluntary groups on their database. The SI Bolton Press and Publicity
team wrote articles for available newsletters and publications. Then we went on to
publicise the event itself through local and regional press releases and local
radio station briefings.
We located suppliers of pop ups, banners and printing. We
established costs of marquee and materials and designed the Soroptimist pop-up displays and banners for the outside of the marquee.
The focus of the
displays was to give a pictorial account of SI Bolton and Soroptimist International in its
global setting, which would not date and show a vibrancy of the group and its
activities.
PHASE 2 – Advertising the
Event: April and May 2010
As
soon as enough voluntary groups had applied or expressed interest, we proceeded
to phase two: continually publicising the event itself. A series of articles were published which
informed the public about the work of these groups and SI Bolton. This
set out to do three things:
a) Inform
people of the Event
b) Increase
the profile and awareness of SI Bolton
c) Increase
the profiles of the chosen volunteer groups
Over the next two months, articles were published in the
local press. Radio stations were briefed
and the event was aired on the “What’s On” part of their programmes and on
their websites.
FUNDING THE EVENT
Bolton Soroptimists funded the whole event through their own
fundraising, sponsorship and donations. We also
encouraged corporate advertising by canvassing local businesses to ask them for sponsorship in return for advertising their businesses in the
Volunteer Directory which would be given to all attendees on the day. As a result of this activity we raised £1,300
towards the Volunteer Directory – plenty to cover the costs! We also raised money through sponsored walks,
training programmes and other events . We raised all the money for the printing, marquee, equipment,
bibs etc and we made a slight profit from the event at the end of the project,
which we put into funding our next venture.
We handed out flyers in the
town centre on three consecutive weekends, put flyers in many public and local
buildings, such as libraries, surgeries, council offices, pharmacies, leisure
centres, post offices and local high schools.
PHASE 3 – The Event
On the BIG DAY we had an early start to set up the
interior of the marquee and greet the stall-holders. 30 local volunteer groups had stands in the marquee 
along
with SI Bolton. All SI Bolton personnel wore their Soroptoimist
bibs, clearly making us visible to the volunteer groups and as a focal point of
contact for the general public. It was the start of a very long day, on the
hottest day of the year so far!
The Mayor and Mayoress attended together with all Bolton’s
MP’s, press, and radio crews (photo, left).
During the course of the day 3,000 people visited the
marquee and watched the street entertainment which was held in the square
outside the marquee. The entertainment
included a circus skills team, two dance groups, a local youth dramatic society, soccer skills and a variety of musical
performances. All entertainers were
in fact Volunteer Groups in Bolton and many had a stand
in the marquee so people could talk to them and find out more. This attracted
people to the venue and find out more.
PHASE FOUR – Post Event Publicity
Following the event 12 separate newspaper articles and radio
presentations were published and broadcast.
EVALUATION METHODS
Evaluation was very important to us. A “Comments Board” for visitor feedback was
located at the exit to the marquee. Many visitors gave their views and opinions about the event which allowed us to get public feedback. All volunteer groups attending the event also
completed evaluation and feedback forms on the day, and completed another
feedback 3 months after the event with results they had gained. SI Bolton also had its own evaluation meeting several
months later.
FINALLY… We
had the whole process including pictures, copies of press releases etc put in
a book to send out to interested parties and for us to keep. We will be happy to send any readers a copy of
the document in computer form. Please contact SIHQ for our contact details!
OVERALL… We consider this event as a milestone in our
Clubs history. The size and scale of the Event, the skills we needed to learn
to make it happen, the way we raised the money and the complete management of
the project. We pushed ourselves, went outside our comfort zone, but above all
else brought the name of Soroptimism back into our town’s experience.