The latest round of our Journalists’ Attitudes and Awareness Monitor research asked 150 reporters and broadcasters across the media about how well charities understand their needs when approaching them with stories.

Encouragingly, nearly three quarters felt that charities were ‘somewhat’ or ‘very’ understanding of their needs, while just 8% said they were not. 21% said charities did this 'neither well nor poorly’.

Many journalists explicitly said that the sector as a whole had seen improvement in this area, however there were also comments highlighting common issues in the contact they have with charities. The biggest of these was charities not tailoring press releases and communications to individual publications, which makes them far less attractive to journalists. The two quotations in the chart above touch on this issue. 

The importance of tailoring your press communications is something many charities understand, but it’s all to easy to include jargon or a more generalist message which can make a story less appealing to a busy journalist. Take it from journalists themselves - a little time researching their needs and making sure your story is a good fit for their audience can really yield dividends. If they can see a story clearly and quickly that fits their audience, coverage is much more likely.

If you're interested in hearing about what journalists think about your organisation's work specifically, contact us for a chat about some of our research on jaam@nfpsynergy.net. We'd love to talk to you about it.