Are We There Yet? was created for the Communications Network by Asibey Consulting and was written jointly by Edith Asibey, Toni Parras and Justin van Fleet. The guide is designed for philanthropic organizations and nonprofits that want to be more effective with their communications. Whether you are using communications to instill healthy nutrition habits in a community or promoting a national energy policy, an effective evaluation strategy can help you keep your communications on track and use your limited resources effectively. This guide offers solutions in an easy-to-use format, which you can adapt to the needs of your organization. Additional copies are available at www.comnetwork.org.

The PUSH Journal (Periodic Updates on Sexual and Reproductive Health Issues Around the World) was among the 10 recipients of The Population Institute’s 2008 Global Media Awards for Excellence in Population Reporting, presented at a ceremony in Los Angeles on Nov. 18. This marks the second time CCMC's PUSH Journal has won a Global Media Award, the first was in 2006.The PUSH Journal won the award for Best Online News Service for its daily updates of sexual and reproductive health issues around the world. The PUSH Journal’s daily e-mail service puts top population stories together in one place, making it one of the most convenient and easy-to-use communication services on population issues.

Since election night and through November 11, there have been roughly 90 stories on reproductive health issues with a majority focusing on abortion rights.  About 40 were on the ballot measures, 17 on religious voters, and 11 featuring the Catholic vote.  Ten were on likely executive orders. Six were on the demise of the conservative movement and its overemphasis on social issues. Coverage is continuing to unfold.

The first round of stories on the day after the election, November 5, centered on the state ballot measures and appeared in state-based media outlets in California, Colorado and South Dakota. These were big wins for the pro-choice coalitions, but the frame was losses for our opposition, rather than wins for pro-choice opponents.

By Thursday and Friday, November 6-7, national stories focused on ballot measures in all states on all key issues. Gannett News Service headline read:  Ballot losses stun abortion foes featuring South Dakota and Colorado and mentioning the 16 new abortion rights supporters elected to Congress.  Much of the overall ballot measure coverage, however, focused on the setbacks for Proposition 8, the so-called “anti-gay marriage” measure in California, with a brief mention of the wins on abortion rights included in those stories.

By the weekend, an editorial in The New York Times, on Sunday, November 9, Voting for Reproductive Freedom, weighed in with the lead: “Voters in three states did the right thing last week by defeating dangerous anti-abortion measures on their ballots.”  

As media began to look at how votes broke down by demographics, a number of outlets looked at religious preferences, highlighting Catholics voting for Obama on economic, not social issues. 

McClatchy-Tribune News Service distributed a long piece: Catholics Voted Their Pocketbooks, on November 8 that was echoed by mid-market media, for example in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel on November 9, Economy Won out Voters of Faith.

Major national media coverage has also started to reflect the Republican Party’s internal debate, “in particular, over how much to emphasize social issues like opposition to abortion rights….,” reported The New York Times, November 11.

Issues related to reproductive health also were linked to news accounts about likely executive orders President-elect Obama is expected to sign to reverse Bush administration policies. On Sunday, November 9, the Washington Post did an overview of the possible executive orders and other rules changes. AP did a similar piece on Monday, November 10 based on Sunday talk show interviews. In media interviews by the next White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and Transition Team Head John Podesta, neither is quoted as mentioning the “global gag rule.” The two spoke almost exclusively about SCHIP, stem cell research, and economic recovery. However, reporters have been inserting the abortion-related executive orders based on earlier Presidential actions by Presidents Clinton and Bush.

Today, November 11, the upcoming U.S. Bishops meeting in Baltimore was reported by CNN with an emphasis on the bishops being “out of synch” with the national electorate post November 4 on abortion and stem cell.

Also today, Stephanie Simon, writing for The Wall Street Journal, November 11 in a piece titled Abortion Foes’ Dilemma: Confront or Cooperate? stated: “After making significant gains during the Bush administration, the anti-abortion movement was dealt sharp setbacks in last week’s election with the defeat of  three state ballot measures restricting  abortion.”

Thus far, there has been a handful of major features about the big picture wins on reproductive health that frame stories around voters attitudes on abortion, the ballot measure wins, and shifts in Congress.  US News and World Report did a blog, 7 Things Obama’s Win Could Mean for Women’s Health. A story that could be easily amplified to other media outlets.

There have been a series of op-eds on religious voters, both pro and con.  Thus, a huge opening for our story could be on the op-ed pages by the pro-choice community based on the various victories during this election.

Remember that time-lapse film in biology class in which a seed sprouts, grows into a full-size plant, withers and dies all in about 30 seconds?

Something close to that has occurred in the case of the $700 billion measure that Congress just passed.

We watched something widely called a “Wall Street bailout” go down in flames on Capitol Hill on September 29. But by the end of the week, essentially the same measure was reborn in the framing of its proponents as a “rescue plan,” a term that was immediately, almost subconsciously, picked up by those who favored it.

The bill sliced through both houses like a hot knife through butter, and had the president’s signature on it before the weekend was over. The episode was an extremely compressed and vivid illustration of the power of framing and message discipline. By finding a new way to refer to the bill, its proponents gave members of Congress who had previously opposed bill a legitimate reason to support it. And by avoiding the use of the B-word, highly quoted figures like Sen. Obama in effect restricted how reporters could characterize the measure.

The media were quick to spot this change. On Sept. 28, Brian Stelter noted in his blog for The New York Times that “

the government’s purchase of troubled assets may amount to a $700 billion bailout of financial institutions. But “bailout” is a word President Bush did not utter last week.”

In a stark example of the way language is used as a public relations tactic, Mr. Bush and other government officials have characterized the measure in positive terms — “rescue plan” and “asset relief program” — thereby carefully avoiding more loaded words like “bailout.”

In picking their own words, Stelter wrote, “the media, by and large, did not follow Mr. Bush’s lead.” As evidence, he did a Google News search on Sept. 28 that produced more than 157,000 results for “bailout” and only 42,000 for “rescue plan.”

As of October 8, the same kind of search shows that “rescue plan” has begun to catch up, but still trails “bailout” 96,000 to 261,000.

So most headline writers and news dispatches may have with “bailout.” But at least one sympathetic editorial writer who chose to write “rescue” reported on his internal dialogue in deciding which term to use.

In his blog of September 30, 2008, Brad Warthen of The State newspaper in Columbia, S.C., revealed that in an editorial for the following day’s paper he

made a conscious decision to refer to the rejected plan as a "rescue," not a "bailout." I hadn't done that before. It's just that in the process of thinking through what ought to happen, it occurred to me that whatever the Congress eventually passes, it's no good if it's just a "bailout;" it needs to be a rescue.

Warthen also found support from both the presidential candidates. A Sept. 29 round up in the Associated Press had Sen. McCain directly addressing the framing issue:

 "The first thing I would do is say, 'Let's not call it a bailout. Let's call it a rescue," McCain told CNN. He said "Americans are frightened right now" and political leaders must give them an immediate solution and a longer-term approach to the problem…”

A separate AP story that same day covered a speech by Sen. Obama this way:

RENO, Nev. (AP) -- Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on Tuesday called for Americans to get behind attempts to salvage a $700 billion rescue plan for the financial sector, saying that if Wall Street fails ordinary people will also be hurt.

 "This is no longer just a Wall Street crisis. It's an American crisis, and it's the American economy that needs this rescue plan," Obama told about 12,000 people at a rally at the University of Nevada at Reno.

Warthen continued:   

You'll notice that not just Obama, but the AP, was using the new official word.

So it looks like everybody got the memo. Except there was no memo. This is the kind of thing that makes disaffected people think the media -- and political leaders, who after all communicate through the media -- are conspiring. But it just happens.

I would disagree slightly. By avoiding the use of the “B” word, Obama in effect nudged the AP writer in the direction of “rescue.” Introducing a loaded term like “bailout” into coverage of a speech in which the word is never uttered runs counter to the kind of straight-up reporting for the AP is known.

Reporters covering Congress, on the other hand, have plenty of examples of politicians talking about a bailout, and so have more leeway in using the term freely, without any suggestion that they are unfairly freighting the issue with negative connotations. They’re just repeating what they are hearing.

Looking ahead, I would guess that in the coming weeks a big factor in determining how it will be characterized is whether it stabilizes the banking system.

If it is seen to be working, it will be easier for news and opinion writers to use “rescue.” But if it is seen to be failing, look for more people marking it down as a “bailout.”

The urgency of the problem – as illustrated by the short spate of daily presidential updates – and the hothouse of presidential politics contributed to this light-speed elevation of a controversial proposal from the odious depths to heroic heights. For those of us who study how words are used to shape or frame a debate, the speed at which the plan was re-framed is an object lesson in the power of words and of message discipline.

When the first edition of Strategic Communications for Nonprofits appeared in 1999, researching news coverage of an issue was time-consuming, expensive or both. To keep up, I would spend an hour or two each week perusing the newspapers and magazines in the library at the National Press Club to see if there were important articles on energy efficiency or any of my other interests. Every month, an extensive index to articles in major US publications would appear to help me fill in what I might have missed.

The research in the pre-Internet era was brutish, nasty and anything but short. It was  pokey, tree-based and full of holes. But we muddled along somehow.
 
(I often muddled in illustrious company. Columnist Mark Shields, a regular on PBS’s “NewsHour,” would often be there digging through the piles next to me. I warned him that if he were caught doing his own research, he could be drummed out of the Pundits League.)

Commercial news retrieval services like LEXIS-NEXIS were long available, but they charged high hourly fees for use of specialized terminals that put them out of reach of most nonprofits. Newspapers were starting to post their current content on-line, but someone trying to find a newpaper story published just two weeks earlier might hit a wall beyond which retrieval of a single article might cost several dollars, which adds up quickly when you’re searching for dozens of articles at a time.

Today, there are several search tools for news that are just as powerful as the paid services of days gone by, and in some instances, they are free of any charge.

One of those tools is the free service of alerts from Google News.   In the left-hand column of this page, right under the Top Stories, is a link to News Alerts, a service that delivers the results of Google searches on any topic or query to your inbox. Yahoo.com offers a similar service, as do CNN.com and other news sites.

For general background on major issues at no cost, the search function on the home page of the New York Times is hard to beat for its depth of coverage, timeliness on current issues, and searchability.  You only have to register on the site to gain access to its amazing free news archives going back to 1981. Articles that appeared earlier than that, including articles stretching all the way back to 1851, are available at a fee.

With research at your fingertips, and often for free, there’s no excuse for not keeping up on your issues so that when you talk to journalists, you will be well-informed and up to speed.

Reporters have always been busy people, and they are getting even more so as news staffs are cut and individual reporters are asked to contribute to to print, Web and multi-media platforms for the same organization.  

In no special order, here are some of the THINGS REPORTERS HATE when dealing with a nonprofit source, and how to WIN THEIR LOVE with a little planning and organization.  

Or at least get a little respect.

REPORTERS HATE…being bounced around from one staff member to the next when they call with a question.

WIN THEIR LOVE…. by having a designated person take incoming media calls, someone who knows exactly how to direct a call.

REPORTERS HATE…getting a response to their question AFTER their deadline has passed.

WIN THEIR LOVE…by noting their deadlines when they first call in – ask about it directly – and making sure your spokespeople get back in a timely fashion.

REPORTERS HATE… picking up the phone and hearing the question, “Did you get my news release?” They might get 100 in a day. Maybe they got yours, but is that what you really want to know?

WIN THEIR LOVE….by incoporating the gist of your release upfront in your pitch call.

For instance,  you can say

“I wanted to be sure you knew about our new report on health care…our upcoming conference call on the latest city council vote…our awards ceremony”

Whatever the content of the release was,  mention it in right away.

For more on successfully pitching journalists, see Strategic Communications for Nonprofits, Chapter 7,  “Earning Good Media Coverage”

There’s excitement brewing at CCMC as the second edition of Strategic Communications for Nonprofits becomes available in early October 2008.  

Four of CCMC’s co-founders wrote the book. Our experience goes back to the days when you had to be sure to set out plenty of ashtrays at a news conference! Hack!

Of course, I was just a pup back then. But even old dogs and learn, and teach, new tricks. To give just on example, nowadays many nonprofits skip the classic stand-up news conference altogether in favor of conference calls with relevant documents and presentations on the Web.  Save trees and wear and tear on all concerned.

The book’s first edition has been in print continuously since 1999, in large part because it is a nuts-and-bolts handbook that covers every facet of communications -- from the basics, such as building a media list, to advanced techniques for conducting TV interviews and reaching reporters in a crisis.

The new edition is greatly revised and expanded to reflect the revolution in communications brought on by the Internet.

Aside this radical re-definition of what is news and who is a journalist,  communications used to be a hard sell to funders and to group leadership. Now it’s built in. Beyond strategy, it’s really become part of the culture of any effective nonprofit organization.

Does this type of content inspire and move voters?