Charity campaigners and fundraisers have long sought TV appearances to help promote their cause and raise their brand awareness.
Traditionally, this might have included an interview on the news or a current affairs programme, or a supporter interview on a live sporting event. For example, case studies of fundraisers for Bliss, the premature baby charity, were broadcast on the BBC during its coverage of the 2012 London Marathon, leading to 70% more visits to the charity's website than the Sunday average.
In recent years, however, TV audiences have become fragmented and spread more thinly across multiple channels. People are seeking more information about topics or people they watch on TV and want to know more about actors or presenters ; they also tweet about a show, someuse social viewing apps like Zeebox.
If the eyes are the windows to the soul, then the internet is the window to the collective human psyche. Google can predict flu epidemics before the NHS by monitoring what people are searching for at any given time, while certain people, places and events can trend globally on Twitter almost spontaneously.
Charities have had to become more creative to win and benefit from a highly-valued mention on a primetime TV show, including diversifying into reality TV and drama, and combining their on-screen campaigning with a social media, web content and search strategies.
Channel 4's The Secret Millionaire has been raising awareness of the work of charities around the country for the past six years. Earlier this series, millionaire Matthew Newbury visited Manchester and volunteered with Moston-based amateur dramatics charity MaD Theatre Company. The charity witnessed almost 35 times more traffic to their website on the day of their appearance on the show, with an another smaller peak in traffic during the Thursday night repeat.
Social activity usually takes place on a "second screen" — a mobile phone, tablet or laptop, providing a set of new opportunities for charities keen to engage with potential supporters. Almost half of MaD's website traffic on the day of The Secret Millionaire came from mobile devices, up from an average of 22%.
TV channels are noticing this change in viewing behaviour and are facilitating its socialisation. The most recent series of Britain's Got Talent provided different hashtags throughout the show, helping to steer the conversation and generate a buzz around their most sensational acts.
Also featured on The Secret Millionaire this series, The Meningitis Trust developed a cross-media marketing strategy to reflect the multi-screen viewing habits of potential supporters. The charity launched a social media campaign during a meningitis storyline on Hollyoaks in March 2012, gaining over a thousand more @meningitistrust mentions than the previous month and 254 new followers.
Richard Hudson, director of communications and digital at the Meningitis Trust, explains: "We prepared tweets ahead of the episode going out, allowing us more time to react to the action unfolding. By providing relevant links and content, marked with the #hollyoaks hashtag we managed to send a strong message out.
"By using Tweetdeck to track what other Twitter users were saying we could respond quickly and accurately, answering questions and raising awareness of how we support those affected by meningitis."
The charity also makes use of influencers to promote their cause — tweets around The Secret Millionaire were retweeted by celebrities as diverse as entrepreneur Duncan Bannatyne, Coronation Street actress Julie Hesmondhalgh and Radio 1 DJ Daniel P Carter, increasing the trust's reach to 600,000 people after the programme was broadcast.
It seems that, just as in real life, people on social networks are moved by human stories and are interested in connecting with other people. Matthew Newbury tweeted around his TV appearance, which increased the number of his followers from 34 to 2,604 during the two hours the show was broadcast, while campaigner Alex Williams increased his followers from 108 to 1,094.
People are also interested in the cause, so make sure your website can be found for the key words and phrases likely to be used during or after your TV appearance. Searches for "meningitis symptoms" increased by 66% when Alex was shown handing out the Meningitis Trust's symptom awareness cards at a local supermarket, but searches for the charity itself only rose by 3%. This suggests that despite being mentioned at least five times during the show, the charity's brand recall amongst viewers wasn't strong enough to prevent them ending up at other meningitis charity websites when searching for the term "meningitis."
We've found that people who click through to charity websites from TV programme sites are more likely to click around beyond their arrival page and find out more than visitors from social networks. The Meningitis Trust capitalised on this by providing links from the homepage to information about meningitis symptoms. Campaigner Alex Williams and newly-recruited ambassador Matthew Newbury, all supported with images and calls to action.
A TV appearance can generate a spike in demand for your services, so make sure you have the resources to deal with a sudden increase in emails or calls and ensure your website and social media presence delivers on expectations created by what is still essentially an entertainment medium.
In summary, TV appearances are a great way to reach millions of people and cheaper than paying for advertising, but should be just one tool in your campaigning kit — a means to start a relationship with potential supporters and a way to drive people to your website and social networks for a deeper level of engagement.
Ed Cox is the managing director of Reason Digital
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