What messages and value drivers can motivate a whole new generation of prospective donors to believe in the United Way message . . . with more than a 1,600% increase in Young Leader donor group affiliation in a single campaign year? United Way of Greater Knoxville found out during its 2014-15 campaign season, with a strategic communications effort targeting Millennials, crafted by Mary Beth West Communications, LLC.

1. Traditional Non-Profit Breaks Mold,
Goes for Millennial Gold
@MaryBethWest @MBWComm @UnitedWayKnox

2. Introduction
• Overview of the Client: United Way of Greater Knoxville
• Overview of Mary Beth West Communications, LLC
• How the Campaign Evolved
• RFP
• Research
• Creative and PR Plan Development
• Community Outreach
• Results Achieved
• Questions

3. Client Overview: UWGK
• Founded locally in 1922
• Raises money from the
community and allocates to
agencies that provide health
and human service programs.
• 2014: 45 partner agencies
offering 97 programs, serving
100,000 people (1 in every 4.5)
in Greater Knoxville
• Now (2016): 50 partner agencies
offering 108 programs

4. Agency Overview: Mary Beth West Communications, LLC
• Based in Alcoa, Tenn. (Greater
Knoxville)
• Founded in 2003 as a public
relations consultancy, focused
on strategic communications
• Evolved services to include
creative / digital development –
but always with a focus on an
integrated approach, inclusive
of public relations strategies

5. United Way’s Situation – Challenges & Opportunity
 Donor decline over recent years (experienced both locally and
nationally)
 Given recent recession, fighting for share of voice
 United Way message has always been “complicated”
 Noted lack of engagement among younger demo (A18-24)
 High donor churn
 Loss of donors upon retirement
Summer 2014:
 Unprecedented opportunity with funding for a major campaign ($250,000)
 Issued a competitive RFP for agency services

6. RFP Differentiator:
MBWC’s Inclusion of Public Relations in
Recommended Work Scope
• Required services as stated in the RFP:
 Creative development
 Media (traditional, nontraditional, and digital) recommendations
 Media planning
 Media buying
• MBWC response included strong PR / media relations element
recommended to aid in the educational and call-to-action
process … not just doing paid media

8. Market Research
In spring 2014, Knoxville-based Bryant Research had conducted a
study, “Survey of Knox County’s Awareness of and Propensity for
Giving to the United Way of Greater Knoxville”
• Telephone survey
• Adults living in Knox County, Tennessee (ages 18+)
• Used quotas based on US Census data for:
• Gender
• Age
• Sample size: 609
• Margin of error (ME) of +/- 4.0% at the 95% confidence interval (CI)

9. Market Research
Key Insights from Bryant Study:
• UWGK had a key non-profit competitor in the marketplace for
mind share (Knox Area Rescue Ministries – KARM) and with a
younger, fairly well-educated donor base and current giving
patterns among local residents.
• Roughly 1-in-5 of those who did not give to the UWGK in the
past 12 months said it was because they gave to other
organizations.

10. Market Research
Key Insights from Bryant Study:
• About half of respondents recalled mention of the UWGK in the
news.
• Most impressions (73%) of the UWGK news were positive.
• Those with positive recall were more likely to report they trust the
United Way of Greater Knoxville.
• Just under half of those surveyed recalled ads for the UWGK.

11. Market Research
Key Insights from Bryant Study:
• Just over half of those aware of the United Way of Greater
Knoxville perceived the organization as helping people with
“basic needs.”
• The majority of respondents were uncertain, however, regarding
the organization’s impact on health, education and income as
defined in the survey.
• Six in ten of those who have not given to any charity in the past 12
months indicated they would donate to an organization if it made a
difference in health.
• Current UWGK allocations were in fairly close alignment with non-givers’
priorities. This presented a messaging opportunity as well.

12. Market Research
Key Insights from Bryant Study:
• Higher levels of uncertainty coupled with lower
concentrations of distrust among 18 to 35 year olds
signaled opportunity to create positive impressions and to
build trust.
• Among the core summary implications:
• Build rapport and preference among the next-generation donor.
• Create additional channels for direct giving, effectively increasing
overall giving and ultimately decreasing reliance on workplace
giving, e.g., understanding the role social media might play in
directed giving

13. Market Research: 2014 Millennial Impact Report
• Sponsored by The Case Foundation
• The most comprehensive and trusted
study of the Millennial generation
(born 1980-2000) and their
involvement with causes
• Study began in 2009 and includes
50,000 participants
• Aims to fill a knowledge gap that
existed in the non-profit / activist
field: How does the Millennial
generation connect, involve and
support causes?

14. Market Research: 2014 Millennial Impact Report
Millennials tend to:
• Support issues rather than organizations
• Prefer to perform smaller actions before fully committing
to a cause
• Be influenced by the decisions and behaviors of their
peers
• Treat all their assets (time, money, network, etc.) as
having equal value
• Need to experience an organization’s work without having
to be on site

15. Market Research: 2014 Millennial Impact Report

16. Our Focus
Develop a campaign that would reach Greater
Knoxville consumers for general awareness-building
and 2014-15 fundraising campaign reach… but also
with a concerted focus on Millennials to build
UWGK’s giving pipeline for the future

17. Audiences
1) Millennials
2) 35-54 year-olds
3) 55+ year-olds
4) Business leaders (those responsible for corporate giving
programs)
5) Young leaders groups
6) Media outlets

18. Overarching Strategies for Engaging Millennials
• Create various channels for engagement
• Develop networks / tap into “Young Leaders” and “Young
Professionals” groups within area civic and professional
organizations in the community, such as Chambers of
Commerce
• Talk about multiple social issues
• Develop sleek, up-to-date online giving options
• Provide an ability for Millennial donors to share the impact
of their contributions with friends and colleagues

19. Key Campaign Elements
• Online Interactive Quiz: What’s Your Giving Style?
• Millennials are avid users of social media, and they bring a
social media sensibility to their charitable giving. They have
developed online identities through which to express who
they are and what they care about. They value feeling
connected to peer and professional networks, and they
want to be able to share the causes they care about with
friends and colleague.

20. Online Interactive Quiz
• What’s Your Giving Style?
• An online, interactive quiz with 4
question sets that would lead
participants to a giving profile
identifying with their answers to the
questions
• Sassy twist for a younger generation,
with a serious call to action at the end
to pay attention to the city around
them
• http://givetoday.uwgk.org/

21. Online Interactive Quiz: What’s Your Giving Style?

25. Key Campaign Elements
• Video Series
• Personal, video story-telling unveiled the seriousness of the
issues at hand. They uncovered the lives of UWGW
beneficiaries before UWGK and the transformation that
occurred since being touched by UWGK. They tugged on the
heartstrings, opened eyes and allowed users to see the real
work UWGK is doing in the community.
• Millennials don’t give because of who you are and how
passionate you are about your cause: they give because of
what you’re doing. They want to know that what you’re
doing is making a real difference and improving lives.

26. Key Campaign Elements
• Video Series – developed multiple videos telling
personal stories of UWGK’s impact
EXAMPLE: Jordan’s story…

30. Key Campaign Elements
• Flash Tattoos for UWGK
Females
• Flash tattoos were a trend
running through the Millennial
female crowd… beautiful,
metallic, jewelry-like temporary
tattoos that even celebrities
were donning. We leveraged
this trend with a campaign for
UWGK.

31. Flash Tattoos
• Using the “chain link” concept to
represent the value of being
“united,” we shared these flash
tattoos in local retail locations and
hot spots throughout Knoxville (UT
Campus Pedestrian Walk, shops
on Market Square, through friends
of Millennial-age employees, etc.),
with custom-print instructions
packaged with the tattoos telling
users to share their images with
hashtags: #UnitedKnox
#LiveUnited.

32. Flash Tattoos

33. Flash Tattoos

34. Key Campaign Elements
• “Friends Don’t Let Friends…” Yeti Cooler Giveaway
Campaign for UWGK Males:
• Guys love a Yeti cooler. They are rugged, durable. They keep
things cold for days and are virtually indestructible. We want to
leverage this love with a campaign for UWGK.
• We used social to advertise the campaign, along with a poster
series in hot spots throughout Knoxville (UT Campus Pedestrian
Walk, shops on Market Square, football tailgates, etc.). Hashtag:
#YetiUnited #liveunited.

35. Yeti Cooler

36. Yeti Cooler

37. Yeti Cooler

38. Yeti Cooler

39. UT Campus Visits / Social

40. UT Campus Visits / Social

42. Other Campaign Elements – Gen Xers
• Workplace Campaign “Toolkit in a Box” -- included
materials and social tools, as well as a “timeline for
execution,” so that each workplace was using the
same materials, in the same way, at the same time
• Interactive Calculator – a web app that showed this
demo exactly where their money at a granular level is
going and what it is doing to produce results

43. Toolkit / Workbook

44. Interactive Calculator
(http://calculator.uwgk.org/)

45. Interactive Calculator

46. Interactive Calculator

47. Interactive Calculator

48. Interactive Calculator

53. Bottom-Line Impact of Campaign
• UWGK Young Leaders Society development and growth
• Society has grown from 185 donors pledging $150,000 (in
2013) to 3,000+ donors pledging $418,000 (2015)
• 1,621% growth in number of “Young Leader” donors
• 278% growth in dollar-volume of contributions from YL
donors (the financial impact from Young Leaders donor
group alone fully paid for the 2014-2015 promotional
campaign, with $18,000 to spare)

54. Bottom-Line Impact of Campaign
• 2013: UWGK raised $12 million
• 2015: UWGK raised $13.15
million
• Knoxville News Sentinel UWGK
“Best of” edition: UWGK placed
3rd among favorite charities
• First time for UWGK to rank
ever in this listing in 93 years
• Other ongoing benefits to UWGK

55. Closing Comments
• Research – integrated insights
• Role and importance of public relations
inclusion in creative campaigns
• Generating creative messaging and
approaches to meet the needs and
expectations of Millennial audiences
• Measuring bottom-line impact