Guest Column: Sept. 11 aftermath shows the value of simply asking
July 1, 2002
Guest Column: Sept. 11 aftermath shows the value of simply asking
Just give people a chance to give
By Spencer Levine
Director of Communications
The Hospices of the National Capital Region
Fairfax, VA
As the first anniversary of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks approaches, the media relations wheels of every hospice should begin turning. The terrible emotions that are sure to resurface on that day will not be limited to people in the affected areas, and providing the emotional support for which hospice is acclaimed should not be limited either. Therefore, the challenge will be to find effective and affordable ways to let the community know hospice is there to help.
The medium with the highest potential impact is often television. Not coincidentally, that is often the most expensive medium in which to advertise or attract public attention.
Even though the federal government requires little of broadcast stations in the way of free public service announcements (PSAs), the good news is that broadcast and cable stations do seem to want to do things they perceive as helpful to the communities they serve. However, before they will give you free air time, you will probably need to meet specific requirements, such as having a message that spotlights programs, services, activities, or issues of community interest, and/or you must be a nonprofit, tax-exempt community group or organization. The requirements may vary, so it is definitely worth contacting your local stations about eligibility for free public service air time to promote a particular event or service.
For example, in the weeks preceding the first anniversary of the terrorist attacks, any hospice offering free counseling to the community after what is likely to be non-stop television news coverage with countless replays of those horrific images of last Sept. 11 should consider approaching local broadcast and cable stations NOW for free public service time in the fall to inform your community that counseling is available.
In fact, you might find, as we did, that your organization’s grief and loss counselors are seen as a valuable resource to the station in terms of its news coverage for this anniversary or other traumatic events that can leave your community with an open wound.
Arranging for free air time is often less of a challenge than actually producing the public service announcement. Some television stations will offer to do it for you, though they may balk at allowing a competing station to use the same PSA. Other stations have neither the time, interest, or resources to do the production.
Sept. 11 had a profound effect on our service area, which includes the Pentagon and the part of suburban Maryland in which most of the Pentagon casualties lived. I knew I would have little difficulty getting air time for a PSA to announce our plans to continue to provide free counseling to the community through the holiday season. However, I did not have the slightest idea how I would pay for its production. Washington, DC, is too large a media market to count on any particular station to produce a PSA for all of the other stations to use. I decided that because I could not afford to pay someone to produce our PSA, I’d have to find someone who could.
I am not a development professional. In fact, I was uncomfortable asking a co-worker to borrow money for lunch one day after discovering in a checkout line that my teenager had secretly raided my wallet during the night. Still, armed with only the nobility of my mission, I set out to find someone to underwrite production of our public service announcement, even though we would be unable to acknowledge their assistance in the PSA they made possible. To do so would make the announcement a commercial, rendering it unsuitable for free public service air time.
What I learned was literally worth almost one hundred thousand dollars. Established donors and local businesses want to help you promote services that they see as crucial in a crisis. All you have to do is ask.
We checked our donor base and found the owner of a local media production company. I know television production is expensive, so I expected "the ask" to be tough, the answer disappointing.
I said, "I want to do a PSA so people in our community will know we will continue to offer free counseling through the holidays. I don’t have any budget for this. And I can’t mention your company’s name in the spot or it won’t be considered a public service."
I was stunned by his response: His offer to provide us with anything we need went far beyond any commitment I had expected. But his explanation is the real lesson to be learned.
Our benefactor said to me what we have been saying in the media all along. By getting involved, taking action, participating in this project, he said, his employees have a chance to do something personally and professionally to aid in our community’s healing. For him, that was worth far more than his company’s name in the spot.
We have been telling the public through the media that this kind of empowerment should not be underestimated. Now I know that to be true by experience.
I am suggesting to other hospice professionals that the same advice applies. While we hope and pray there will never be another experience like Sept. 11, we know there will always be disasters, both natural and man-made, after which the community involved will need our help to heal.
While we were fortunate enough to have the owner of a television production company among our donors, the point is that he would have helped us anyway. He saw the value to the community in promoting our services and the value to his company in providing employees a chance to get actively involved in healing the community.
There are few towns across the country without access to television, so production companies will likely be nearby. That is the first place to ask for help to promote your services. If a production company cannot donate all of its services, perhaps it can donate some of its services or reduce its prices. It might also put you in touch with other production professionals, such as cameramen, actors, and writers who might donate their services individually.
If all else fails and you must pay the full cost of production, pooling donations from several hospice supporters or local businesses solicited expressly for this purpose will enable each to contribute a manageable amount, the sum of which would cover the production costs. And they may thank you for providing a way to help your community.
We have found success in thanking our benefactors in a variety of ways: public acknowledgement in a news conference, placing articles in the local paper, an invitation to a special hospice event to be thanked publicly, and a mention in our donor publication that reaches the local business community.
Hospices need not wait for a tragedy to occur before they collaborate with a local production company or solicit donors or businesses for a special project. Even when there is no emergency forcing you to get your message out right now, local businesses might just be looking for a way to demonstrate to present and future clients their commitment to the community and to local charity.
All you have to do is ask.
(Editor’s note: The Hospices of the National Capital Region, celebrating its 25th anniversary this year, comprises Hospice of Northern Virginia, Hospice Care of DC, Hospice of Prince George’s County, Hospice of Suburban Maryland, and the Halquist Memorial Inpatient Hospice Center. The writer was formerly a network television producer, radio writer, and newspaper reporter. His e-mail address is [email protected].)
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