DEFINITION OF ADVOCACY

Advocacy is defined as a key concept in social work practice. It is defined as exerting

influence on behalf of organisations and groups within legal power and political
structure.

” Advocacy involves either an individual or group, or their representatives, pressing their

case with influential others, about situations which either affect them directly or, and
more usually, try to prevent proposed changes, which will leave them worse off” .
(Pardeck, 1996).

Advocacy is a concept embraced by social work and advocating for clients is vital for the social
work profession. The primary goals of advocacy are achieving social justice and people
empowerment. In achieving these goals, a proactive, responsive and participatory approach is
necessary (Pardeck, 1996).

The advocacy role, from a social context, includes the redistribution of power and recourse to an
individual or group, guarding their rights and preserving their values, conserving their best
interests and overcoming the sense of powerlessness (Pardeck, 1996. pg 151).

Advocacy
 Robert L. Schneider, Lori Lester and Julia Ochieng
 https://doi.org/10.1093/acrefore/9780199975839.013.10
Summary
Social work advocacy is “the exclusive and mutual representation of a client(s) or a cause in a
forum, attempting to systematically influence decision-making in an unjust or unresponsive
system(s).” Advocacy was identified as a professional role as far back as 1887, and social
workers consider client advocacy an ethical responsibility. Social workers are increasing the use
of electronic advocacy to influence client issues and policy development. As client and societal
needs evolve, universities should emphasize advocacy in their curricula, and the National
Association of Social Workers should promote electoral and legislative initiatives that reflect an
emphasis on social and economic injustices.

What is Advocacy and Why is It Important?

Last edited: October 30, 201
What is an Advocacy Campaign?

An advocacy campaign is a set of actions targeted to create support for a policy

or proposal. See: Legislative Advocacy Resource Guide: Promoting Human Rights
in Bosnia and Herzegovina , Global Rights, 4, 2005.

The goals of an advocacy campaign may range from drafting and passing a new or
amended law against domestic violence; to reforming the judicial system; to
litigating a test case using international human rights standards in domestic
courts; to monitoring the implementation of international human rights standards
in a local context.

Why is Advocacy Important?

Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and human rights defenders around the

world are working to advocate for the protection of women from all forms of
gender-based violence. Gender-based violence is a form of discrimination against
women and is a fundamental violation of the right to life, liberty and security of
person. See: the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination
Against Women , Arts. 1 and 2, 1981; General Recommendation No. 19
(1992) ; General Comment No. 16 of the Committee on Economic, Cultural and
Social Rights (2005) . Advocacy to end violence against women is closely linked
with the elimination of discrimination, which in turn, is necessary to achieve full
equality between men and women.

Advocacy designed to change systems is distinct from advocacy on behalf of an

individual victim of violence in the courts or within the community. Systems
advocacy means efforts to change policy and practice at the local, national or
international level; to change the situation for groups of individuals who share
similar problems. While systems advocacy works to improve the system to the
benefit of individuals, it is a long-term approach to problem solving requiring
sustained effort. (See: Advocacy Tools , StopVAW, The Advocates for Human
Rights)

Individual advocacy focuses on changing the situation for an individual and

protecting her rights. See: Victim Protection, Support and Assistance , StopVAW.
Both systems and individual advocacy are critical to ending violence against
women and girls. However, the focus of this section of the Legislation Module is
on advocacy at the policy and systems level.
Advocates working at the system level must always keep the practical needs of
victims in mind when changing policies and systems. An effective strategy to
address violence against women and girls should incorporate both practical and
policy and systems change activities. Many NGO activities function on both of
these levels simultaneously. (See: Advocacy Tools , StopVAW and Women’s Human
Rights Step by Step , Women, Law & Development International and Human Rights
Watch (1997), p. 121).

Advocacy for systems change should aim to improve respect for and the
protection of women's human rights. Within the broad human rights framework,
advocacy initiatives should reflect of specific country conditions. Advocacy
initiatives under the human rights perspective, however, tend to focus on
improving the human rights system at all levels, meaning from local government
institutions up to intergovernmental organizations, such as the United Nations.
See: Advocacy Tools , StopVAW.

Those who advocate for the human rights of women and girls or “women human
rights defenders” may be at risk of the very human rights violations they are
attempting to remedy. Women human rights defenders may experience gender-
based discrimination, prejudice, public repudiation, threats of and actual violence
against them. In holding governments accountable, women human rights
defenders may even face arrest, detention or death. As of January 2007, the UN
Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders had received 449
cases of violations against women human rights defenders. (See: Claiming Rights,
Claiming Justice: A Guidebook on Women Human Rights Defenders , Asia Pacific
Forum on Women, Law and Development, 15-17, 2007)
  WHAT IS ADVOCACY?
 DOES ADVOCACY ALWAYS INVOLVE CONFRONTATION?
 WHY AND WHEN WOULD YOU CHOOSE ADVOCACY?
 WHAT ARE THE BASIC COMPONENTS OF ADVOCACY?

WHAT IS ADVOCACY?
Before direct action comes planning, and before planning comes an understanding of what needs
to be put in the plan. So first, here's a reminder of what advocacy is (as well as what it's not).

 Advocacy is active promotion of a cause or principle

 Advocacy involves actions that lead to a selected goal
 Advocacy is one of many possible strategies, or ways to approach a problem
 Advocacy can be used as part of a community initiative, nested in with other components.
 Advocacy is not direct service
 Advocacy does not necessarily involve confrontation or conflict

Some examples may help clarify just what advocacy is:

 You join a group that helps build houses for the poor--that's wonderful, but it's not advocacy (it's
a service)
 You organize and agitate to get a proportion of apartments in a new development designated as
low to moderate income housing - that's advocacy
 You spend your Saturdays helping sort out goods at the recycling center - that's not advocacy (it's
a service)
 You hear that land used for the recycling center is going to be closed down and you band together
with many others to get the city to preserve this site, or find you a new one. Some of you even
think about blocking the bulldozers, if necessary - that's advocacy

Advocacy usually involves getting government, business, schools, or some other large institution
(also known as Goliath) to correct an unfair or harmful situation affecting people in the
community (also known as David, and friends). The situation may be resolved through
persuasion, by forcing Goliath to buckle under pressure, by compromise, or through political or
legal action.
Several ingredients make for effective advocacy, including:

 The rightness of the cause

 The power of the advocates (i.e., more of them is much better than less)
 The thoroughness with which the advocates researched the issues, the opposition, and the climate
of opinion about the issue in the community
 Their skill in using the advocacy tools available (including the media)
 Above all, the selection of effective strategies and tactics

For some people, advocacy is a new role. It may be uncomfortable--particularly if confrontation

and conflict are involved. But, for others, advocacy is more attractive than setting up and running
service programs in the community.
Advocacy can be glamorous: the David vs. Goliath image, manning the barricades, making
waves. But the decision to put major resources into advocacy is not one to be taken lightly. If it
doesn't work--if you stick your necks way out and don't succeed--not only will you fail, but you
may do so in public, discrediting your cause, perhaps making conditions worse for the people
you set out to help.

DOES ADVOCACY ALWAYS INVOLVE

CONFRONTATION?
Advocacy can be confrontational, but conflict is usually a bad place to start. Good advocates
know they must think very hard about any confrontation that's going to be necessary. That's one
reason for careful planning of strategy and tactics. Even if the issue seems as clear as a bell, and
your choice of actions seems just as obvious, it's a good idea to take another long, hard look.

WHY AND WHEN WOULD YOU CHOOSE

ADVOCACY?
Advocacy is best kept for when "routine" work such as gathering support for a cause, raising
money, and recruiting members of a community initiative or program won't get you where you
want to go.
In most cases, it's a good idea to think twice before launching yourselves (or your group) as
advocates, because it's a strategy that's more effective if there isn't too much of it around.
Imagine a city where there were public demonstrations every day, where City Hall was besieged
constantly by groups with special petitions, resolutions, and assorted agitations. The community
would quickly develop advocacy fatigue. So would the advocates.
The best time to start planning for an advocacy campaign is:

 When your direct experience or preliminary research shows you cannot achieve your goals in any
other way
 When you are sure you have (or will have) the capacity to carry it through
 When you have enough enthusiasm and energy to last for what could be a long haul!

This chapter will help you get launched. And this particular section will give you a taste of
what's coming up in the seven remaining sections of the chapter, where you will gain a deeper
understanding of the issue, identify allies and opponents, plan out your strategy and tactics, and
evaluate your efforts.

WHAT ARE THE BASIC COMPONENTS OF

ADVOCACY?
Each of these components is addressed in greater depth in the following sections of this chapter,
but this is a broad overview of how to advocate for your issue.
SURVIVAL SKILLS FOR ADVOCATES
Once you go public with an advocacy campaign, you may draw the attention of a number of
people, not all of whom will wish you well. If things go wrong, you could end up looking very
silly in the local news, which would not be good for your future campaigns. Even worse, in some
circumstances a wrong step could land you in court. At the very least, there's a risk of spinning
your wheels if you don't go about the many tasks of advocacy efficiently.
For example, to look at a worst-case scenario, think of what could go wrong with a campaign to
promote better health for the poor:

 You accuse the local hospital of turning away a sick patient, without checking your facts. The
hospital proves that it treated the man, but he discharged himself early.
 You push your allies out of shape by launching a press release that uses their name, without
checking the wording with them first.
 You announce a big demonstration outside the hospital, and only three people show up.

It's amateur night!

In the next section of this chapter, we've gathered 20 tips that will help members of your group
avoid disasters. They'll be able to take on their tasks efficiently, confidently, and with a low risk
of tripping over their shoelaces.
UNDERSTANDING THE ISSUE
You probably already have a pretty good idea of what the issue or problem is.
For example:

 You are aware of a growing problem of homelessness, particularly among people with small
children
 You feel that not nearly enough is being done in your community to prevent youth smoking
 Your group is afraid that a new industrial park up river will pollute the water

However, it is important to develop a deeper unstanding of the issue, including research

to analyze of who has power. Remember, advocacy is about power--who can influence things
that matter. You will need to know where the power of your opponents lies, and how you can
most effectively influence or confront it.
RECOGNIZING ALLIES
If you are the only people in town who want something done about the problem you have
identified, your cause could be in trouble. It's one thing to fight city hall: much harder to take on
a whole community of hostile or indifferent people. If there are only a handful of people on your
side, it may be all too easy for those in power to dismiss you as the lunatic fringe. One of your
jobs will be to make that "fringe" start to look like a representative slice of the whole population
affected by the issue. Then people in power will take notice.
Somewhere, there are allies - people who can band together with you and give your cause bulk,
visibility, and clout. You can use methods such as a "power grid" that will help you pinpoint
those groups and agencies in town that have the power to help your group. This grid will also
help you identify specific ways in which these potential allies can help.
Of course, you'll need to be careful about who you invite on board--some allies may bring
baggage that you don't need. We'll help you balance potential benefits against potential risks, and
come up with some useful backers who will help, rather than hinder, your cause - whether you
want to build a full-fledged coalition, or an informal alliance or network.
In addition to deciding whether other groups have an interest in your cause, it's important to find
out if an alliance with them is in your interest. For example, suppose you are planning to make
life difficult for retailers who sell cigarettes to kids, and you know that the American Cancer
Society, a couple of local youth groups, and a pair of enlightened churches have the same goals.
Just how can you best help each other? Do you want a close relationship? Suppose these people
are limited by their own charters in the type of action they can get involved in? Suppose they
might want to take over the direction of the whole campaign? Suppose they are with your
interests on some matters, and against you in others?
IDENTIFYING OPPONENTS AND RESISTANCE
Although it's possible to advocate without having an opponent (for example, you may be
working largely to overcome ignorance and inertia), most advocacy campaigns have a
recognizable Goliath--or even several big (and potentially mean) kids on the block. Who are
your opponents? Why are they putting up resistance? And what can you do about it?
Those questions should be answered together. There's not much point knowing the names of
your opponents unless you also know why they are opposing you. Sometimes, this may not be
for the most obvious reasons, so you'll need to know what's going on.
Starting with the cause for resistance is often more fruitful than starting with a list of people you
expect to be bad guys: you may get some surprises. For example, a big developer might turn out
to support your drive for more low-cost housing, because he recognizes that the presence of
homeless people in the neighborhood can deter rich people from buying his expensive houses.
Similarly, people from whom you might expect support might turn out to oppose you. Perhaps a
big agency that seems to share your goals is bent out of shape because you seem to be
trespassing on their turf or accusing them of ineffectiveness in the past. You can't take anything
for granted.
ENCOURAGING INVOLVEMENT OF POTENTIAL OPPONENTS AS
WELL AS ALLIES
Once you have a plan, you'll know where you are going, and how to get there. That will give you
confidence, and that confidence will give you clout. Armed with that, you may be able to
approach certain groups or individuals whom you thought were opposed to you. Maybe they still
are, but you may find that you can find help in unexpected quarters. Now that your plan makes
you more business-like, people may decide to cut a deal. Or, now that your position can be made
clear to others as well as to yourselves, you may find that although a certain group still may
oppose you on some issues, you are on the same side of others.
DEVELOPING A PLAN FOR ADVOCACY
Planning for advocacy is often a complex program because we have to deal with power and
opposition. As you know by now, an advocate will usually have to overcome obstacles much
greater than "mere" inertia, or lack of funds, which are often the main barriers where other types
of community development projects are concerned. In advocacy situations, there are likely to be
well-prepared opponents waiting in the tall grass. And they will need to be out-planned.
You will need to develop a plan based on your knowledge of who those opponents are; and
knowledge of who can help you.
For a useful analogy, we'll invite you to think of the overall campaign as a building project:

 Your vision and mission is to provide a place to live that is warm and safe
 Your objective is to build a house
 Your strategy will take the form of blueprints for the house
 Your action plan will include the specifics: who will pour the concrete for the foundation, put up
a frame, add the roof, et cetera, and when will they do it

And all will go together as part of one big action plan.

IN SUMMARY
Advocacy is exciting work. You get the pleasure of fighting the good fight, and sometimes, the
thrill of victory. In order to have that, though, you need to get through all of the day-to-day
details and specifics. You'll need to keep an eye on the forest while working on the trees
individually. By going through this chapter carefully, we think you will be better prepared to
bring about the changes that matter to your community.

Advocacy
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Advocacy is an activity by an individual or group that aims to influence decisions within

political, economic, and social institutions. Advocacy includes activities and publications
to influence public policy, laws and budgets by using facts, their relationships, the
media, and messaging to educate government officials and the public. Advocacy can
include many activities that a person or organization undertakes including media
campaigns, public speaking, commissioning and publishing research. Lobbying (often
by lobby groups) is a form of advocacy where a direct approach is made
to legislators on a specific issue or specific piece of legislation.[1] Research[whose?] has
started to address how advocacy groups in the United States[2] and Canada[3] are using
social media to facilitate civic engagement and collective action.
An advocate is someone who provides advocacy support to people who need it.[citation needed]

Forms[edit]
There are several forms of advocacy, each representing a different approach in a way
to initiate changes in the society. One of the most popular forms is social
justice advocacy.[according to whom?]
The initial definition does not encompass the notions of power relations, people's
participation and a vision of a just society as promoted by social justice advocates. For
them, advocacy represents the series of actions taken and issues highlighted to change
the “what is” into a “what should be”, considering that this “what should be” is a more
decent and a more just society (ib., 2001.)[full citation needed] Those actions, which vary with the
political, economic and social environment in which they are conducted, have several
points in common (ib., 2001.)[full citation needed] They:

 Question the way policy is administered

 Participate in the agenda-setting as they raise significant issues
 Target political systems "because those systems are not responding to people's needs"
 Are inclusive and engaging
 Propose policy solutions
 Open up space for public argumentation
Other forms of advocacy include:

 Budget advocacy: another aspect of advocacy that ensures proactive engagement of Civil
Society Organizations with the government budget to make the government more
accountable to the people and promote transparency. Budget advocacy also enables
citizens and social action groups to compel the government to be more alert to the needs
and aspirations of people in general and the deprived sections of the community.
 Bureaucratic advocacy: people considered "experts" have more chance to succeed at
presenting their issues to decision-makers. They use bureaucratic advocacy to influence the
agenda, although at a slower pace.
 Express versus issue advocacy: These two types of advocacy when grouped together
usually refers to a debate in the United States whether a group is expressly making their
desire known that voters should cast ballots in a particular way, or whether a group has a
long-term issue that isn't campaign and election season specific.
 Health advocacy: supports and promotes patients' health care rights as well as enhance
community health and policy initiatives that focus on the availability, safety and quality of
care.
 Ideological advocacy: in this approach, groups fight, sometimes during protests, to advance
their ideas in the decision-making circles.
 Interest-group advocacy: lobbying is the main tool used by interest groups doing mass
advocacy. It is a form of action that does not always succeed at influencing political
decision-makers as it requires resources and organization to be effective.
 Legislative advocacy: the "reliance on the state or federal legislative process" as part of a
strategy to create change.[4]
 Mass advocacy: any type of action taken by large groups (petitions, demonstrations, etc.)
 Media advocacy: "the strategic use of the mass media as a resource to advance a social or
public policy initiative" (Jernigan and Wright, 1996). In Canada, for example, the Manitoba
Public Insurance campaigns illustrate how media advocacy was used to fight alcohol and
tobacco-related health issues. We can also consider the role of health advocacy and the
media in “the enactment of municipal smoking bylaws in Canada between 1970 and 1995.” [5]
 Special education advocacy: advocacy with a "specific focus on the educational rights of
students with disabilities."
Different contexts in which advocacy is used:
 In a legal/law context: An "advocate" is the title of a specific person who is
authorized/appointed in some way to speak on behalf of a person in a legal process.
 In a political context: An "advocacy group" is an organized collection of people who seek to
influence political decisions and policy, without seeking election to public office.
 In a social care context: Both terms (and more specific ones such as "independent
advocacy") are used in the UK in the context of a network of interconnected organisations
and projects which seek to benefit people who are in difficulty (primarily in the context of
disability and mental health).
 In the context of inclusion: Citizen Advocacy organisations (or programmes) seek to cause
benefit by reconnecting people who have become isolated. Their practice was defined in
two key documents: CAPE, and Learning from Citizen Advocacy Programs.
Tactics[edit]
Margaret E. Keck and Kathryn Sikkink have observed four types of advocacy tactics:

1. Information politics: quickly and credibly generating politically usable information and
moving it to where it will have the most impact.
2. Symbolic politics: calling upon symbols, actions, or stories that make sense of a situation
for an audience that is frequently far away.
3. Leverage politics: calling upon powerful actors to affect a situation where weaker
members of a network are unlikely to have influence.
4. Accountability politics: efforts to hold powerful actors to their previously stated policies or
principles.[6]
These tactics have been also observed within advocacy organizations outside the USA.
[7]

Aims[edit]
Advocacy in all its forms seeks to ensure that people, particularly those who are most
vulnerable in society, are able to:[citation needed]

 Have their voice heard on issues that are important to them

 Defend and safeguard their rights
 Have their views and wishes genuinely considered when decisions are being made about
their lives

1. Leading a change towards a greater social justice and equality

Advocacy is a process of supporting and enabling people to:[citation needed]

 Express their views and concerns

 Access information and services
 Defend and promote their rights and responsibilities
 Explore choices and options
Use of the Internet[edit]
Groups involved in advocacy work have been using the Internet to accomplish
organizational goals. It has been argued that the Internet helps to increase the speed,
reach and effectiveness of advocacy-related communication as well as mobilization
efforts, suggesting that social media are beneficial to the advocacy community.[3][8][9][2]
Other examples[edit]
Advocacy activities may include conducting an exit poll or the filing of an amicus brief.

Topics[edit]
See also: social issue

People advocate for a large number and variety of topics. Some of these are clear-
cut social issues that are universally agreed to be problematic and worth solving, such
as human trafficking. Others—such as abortion—are much more divisive and inspire
strongly-held opinions on both sides. There may never be a consensus on this latter
type of issues, but intense advocacy is likely to remain. In the United States, any issue
of widespread debate and deeply-divided opinion can be referred to as a social issue.
The Library of Congress has assembled an extensive list of social issues in the United
States, ranging from vast ones like abortion to same-sex marriage to smaller ones
like hacking and academic cheating.[10]
Topics that appear to involve advancing a certain positive ideal are often known as
causes. A particular cause may be very expansive in nature — for instance,
increasing liberty or fixing a broken political system. For instance in 2008, U.S.
presidential candidate Barack Obama utilized such a meaning when he said, "this was
the moment when we tore down barriers that have divided us for too long; when we
rallied people of all parties and ages to a common
cause."[11] Change.org and Causes are two popular websites that allow people to
organize around a common cause.
Topics upon which there is universal agreement that they need to be solved include, for
example, human trafficking, poverty, water and sanitation as a human right.[12]
"Social issues" as referred to in the United States also include topics (also known as
"causes") intended by their advocates to advance certain ideals (such as equality)
include: civil rights, LGBT rights, women's rights, environmentalism, and veganism.

Transnational advocacy[edit]
Advocates and advocacy groups represent a wide range of categories and support
several issues as listed on worldadvocacy.com.[13] The Advocacy Institute,[14] a US-based
global organization, is dedicated to strengthening the capacity of political, social, and
economic justice advocates to influence and change public policy.[15]
The phenomenon of globalization draws a special attention to advocacy beyond
countries’ borders. The core existence of networks such as World Advocacy or
the Advocacy Institute demonstrates the increasing importance of transnational
advocacy and international advocacy. Transnational advocacy networks are more likely
to emerge around issues where external influence is necessary to ease the
communication between internal groups and their own government. Groups of
advocates willing to further their mission also tend to promote networks and to meet
with their internal counterparts to exchange ideas.[6]
Transnational advocacy is increasingly playing a role in advocacy for migrants rights,
and migrant advocacy organizations have strategically called upon governments and
international organizations for leverage.[7]
Transnational advocates spend time with local interest groups in order to better
understand their views and wishes.

5 Essential Steps to Planning Your Next Advocacy Campaign

A professional chef plans out a five-course meal. A teacher lines up a

lesson plan. A paperboy maps out a route. And a digital campaigner
plans out an advocacy campaign.

If you want to be successful in your advocacy work, you need to be

strategic in how you go about running an advocacy campaign. That
strategizing relies heavily on your ability to not only plan but also
establish the best possible plan.

There’s not a one-size-fits-all blueprint for every advocacy campaign.

There are too many variables, between your cause, goals, advocates,
and more.
 Not to fear! You can follow a series of steps that have the kind of
flexibility you’ll need to customize your campaign plan to your
specific aims.

The five steps to developing a strong advocacy campaign of any kind

are:

1. Set a Goal.
2. Define Your Message.
3. Build a Team.
4. Map Out a Timeline.
5. Develop Your Communications and Activities.

Your organization can take this template and make it your own,
personalizing it to accomplish your specific goals. In this post, we'll talk
through one at a time, starting with setting a goal.

Advocacy Campaign Strategy #1. Set a Goal

Trying to plan an advocacy campaign without setting a goal is like

trying to hit a piñata while wearing a blindfold. You might succeed, but
you might also exert a lot of unnecessary energy along the way.

With an advocacy campaign, setting a discrete goal can be

intimidating. Advocacy is about enacting change, often on a grand
scale. While fixing the wrongs in the world is an inspirational and
 motivating goal, it’s not the kind of goal you can actually create a plan
to accomplish. You need specificity.

The best goals for advocacy campaigns follow the SMART heuristic:

 Specific
 Measurable
 Actionable
 Realistic
 Time-Bound

From that list you can see how “fixing the wrongs in the world,” though
noble, isn’t a SMART goal. Instead you’ll want something far more
manageable, like stopping a bill from passing or changing a specific
policy.

SMART goals are incredibly important when planning grassroots

advocacy campaigns. Because the main actors in grassroots
advocacy campaigns are regular people instead of nonprofit or
advocacy professionals, they need specific guidance, reinforcement,
and measurable benchmarks to stay on track.

Without breaking down your goals into attainable steps and tackling
them one at a time, your grassroots supporters will get discouraged by
the lack of visible progress.

Of course, your goal isn't much use if you can't track your progress
toward it. For that, you need advocacy software like Salsa, which
produces custom reports to track your unique goals:
With dashboards at your fingertips, you can ensure that every step
your team takes is a step toward completion of your goals.

Advocacy Campaign Strategy #2. Define Your Message

Once you have your SMART goal, get ready to define your message.
Your message is what unifies your organization and attracts people to
your campaign.

To revisit the piñata example from the goal-setting section of this post,
an advocacy campaign without a clearly defined message would be
like attending a party with a piñata, St. Patrick’s day decorations, a
birthday cake, and mistletoe hanging in the door frames.
 If your message isn’t clearly defined, supporters will have as good a
chance of figuring out your goal as someone would ascertaining the
theme of that very confusing party.

Potential supporters need to know what your advocacy campaign

is about. So once you've settled on a focused message, it's time to
share it widely.

You should reach out to individuals who have supported your

organization in the past first, then expand your reach to
individuals who have supported other organizations or causes similar
to yours. A great advocacy software solution can help by:

 Storing contact information of individuals who have supported previous campaigns.

 Highlighting connections between past and potential supporters.
 Integrating with your social media profiles to schedule posts.
 Providing current supporters with the tools to spread your message to their social circles.

With Salsa, you can do all of the above (and more!) with highly
customizable action alerts, like this one:
You should ensure that as members of your team spread your
message to potential supporters, they're all on the same page. Read
on to the next section to learn about putting together a team that can
sustain this cohesion in messaging!

Advocacy Campaign Strategy #3. Build a Team

Chances are, if you already have a goal and your message, you likely
have some team members on board. But before you start, you need to
make sure you have a team that can work well together and represent
all the needs of the campaign.
 You'll need a team leader, authorities in advocacy campaigns,
specialists in the subject matter of your campaign,
communications managers, software experts or consultants, and
administrative help, among others.

Because a grassroots advocacy relies so heavily on empowering

supporters, when launching a grassroots advocacy campaign, perhaps
most important on that list is a motivational, organized leader.

You might already have someone in-house that would be a great fit to
lead your advocacy campaign. The advantage to hiring from within is
the familiarity existing staff members have with your organization. You
don't have to explain what your organization values or how you
operate because they already know!

There are also benefits to looking outside your organization for

an advocacy campaign lead — namely, the value of an outside
perspective. Sometimes, it takes an outsider to recognize areas of
improvement.

Whether you decide to recruit from within or without, look for these
qualities in a strong campaign director:

 Excellent communication skills. Your supporters need encouragement, so you need

someone who can motivate them to get out there and make a change.
 Specialized experience. Bringing on someone with practical experience leading an
advocacy campaign will greatly decrease the amount of time you need to get oriented.
 Existing connections. To make sure your supporters will be heard by the right people, you
need a leader who knows the best decision-makers to reach out to.

A strong leader will be able to take an advocacy campaign to

completion.
 Advocacy Campaign Strategy #4. Map Out a Timeline

The most successful traditional fundraising campaigns are those that

are planned well in advance. A strict editorial calendar can keep these
campaigns on track to meet their goals, with your fundraising team
firmly in control of the timeline.

Advocacy campaigns, particularly grassroots advocacy campaigns,

don't work like that, for a few important reasons:

 Your supporters bear a much greater burden of action with a grassroots

campaign. You're relying on and encouraging their passion to motivate them to action, not
your fundraising team.
 Setting goals and strategy isn't as straightforward. While you can decide on an amount
to raise for a fundraising campaign at the beginning, the political situation will affect your
advocacy strategy and goals throughout the campaign.
 You're not asking for material donations with an advocacy campaign — you're asking
for time, passion, and energy, which are sustained forms of support rather than one-time
or recurring contributions.

To ensure that your organization can plan for effectiveness and

flexibility, you need software built specifically for advocacy.

The right advocacy software will keep your campaign organized, just
like traditional fundraising software, with dashboards and reporting.
The difference is most obvious in the necessary communication
features.
There's a lot you need to share with your supporters, such as
important campaign updates, online petitions, lists of legislators and
their contact information, and materials for them to share with their
own social networks. Advocacy software facilitates close connections
with your supporters via newsletters, automatic alerts, social media,
and more.

Be sure that you choose software with communication features that

can support the kind of flexibility your advocacy campaign needs to be
successful!

Advocacy Campaign Strategy #5. Develop Your Communications and Activities

Step five is necessary to carry out the good work you’ve done in steps
one through four. You need a means of channeling all of your planning
into effective action.

The means in question? Communications and activities.

You’ll have been coming up with various actions throughout the

planning process, but it is important to take the time to put
metaphorical pen to paper and actually turn some of your ideas into
reality, then market them effectively to your supporters.
 The great news is that you have plenty of opportunities to send
out communications and host activities; you just need to decide
what’s best given your cause, your organization, and your
resources.

You could send out an online petition, have volunteers call members
of the community, or host a town-hall-style meeting to discuss the
issue. With Salsa, you could even coordinate all three or some
combination thereof. Check out Salsa's targeted action feature, which
allows you to send messages to pre-set segments of your supporters:

As you select your actions, ask:

 What is my end goal?

 Who/What needs to be reached in order to make this goal come true?
 How can my team best accomplish that?
Remember that supporters and the people you’ll be working with to
accomplish your goal are far more likely to help if you meet them on
their terms and engage them.

For example, let's say you're sending out a targeted action that asks
supporters to contact their legislator. You'll want to tailor this request
to each individual supporter, rather than send out a generic call to
action.

Using data recorded in your CRM, you can segment your supporters
by their region, legislator, interests, or other key factors. Then, you'll
send customized targeted action forms (like petitions) to these specific
supporters.

That way, people always feel like your organization is speaking directly
to them and values their support personally. When individuals are
confident that your team takes their support seriously, they'll be more
likely to take action for your cause today and in the future.

8 Strategies and Techniques for

Running an Advocacy Campaign
by Mark Kelly, on December 18, 2017

Whether you’re just ramping up an advocacy campaign, in the thick of

it, or reflecting back on a recent effort, there’s value in evaluating your
practices and seeing where you could improve your campaigns.
 If you’re running an advocacy campaign, you’re clearly dedicated to
the mission behind your goals. So logically, you’d want to do
everything in your power to make the most of your work.

Once you have your plan in place, you’ll need to employ a selection of
best practices to maximize your efforts.

There are numerous best practices for running an advocacy campaign

because the campaigns can be so varied themselves.

To begin, try out these 8 best practices and see where they take your
advocacy campaign:

1. Eight questions that will guide your advocacy strategy

2. Remember the relationship between online and offline activities.
3. Consider the impact.
4. Ensure your action step is front and center.
5. Contact in the best way possible.
6. Keep your friends close.
7. Be crystal clear.
8. Continuously grow your supporter list (9 ways).

Once you've learned more about running an advocacy campaign, you

can also look into grassroots advocacy. Check out this helpful
guide for more information.

Now, let's jump into our 8 tips!

1. Eight questions that will guide your advocacy

strategy.
1. What is your campaign’s or organization’s theory of change?
A theory of change is bigger than an action plan: it’s a logic model that maps your process
of change from beginning to end. The map works backwards from the outcomes you’re
seeking, stepping back to name the building blocks that will be essential to get you from
here to there, and being explicit with your assumptions about how you think change is
going to happen.

2. What is your campaign’s “superpower”

Defining a superpower is about the campaign’s value proposition – the quality or
characteristic that is going to compel people to join you. What unique
skill/perspective/asset does the campaign bring to your advocacy space that no one else
does?

3. What is your campaign’s overarching goal?

A campaign goal must be selective, strategic, focused and winnable.

4. What incremental objectives support your goal?

Objectives are the stepping stones on the path to achieving your goal. They should be
more bite-sized and more specific than your goal, and they should be instrumentally
 relevant to winning.

5. What are your campaign’s core strategies?

Strategies answer the question “how.” They show how you’re going to approach the targets
of the campaign, what levers need to be pushed to win, and how you’re going to push
them.

6. Who do you need to power your campaign?

“Anybody who cares about my issue” is generally not a good answer to this question.
Examine the interests, positions and conflicts of your stakeholders and targets. Think
strategically about which constituencies could be most instrumental to achieving some or
all of your objectives, or who could have the greatest multiplier effect.

7. How will the campaign engage its supporters? How will the tactics get executed?
What kinds of action opportunities is the campaign offering constituents, members, or
volunteers? The era of one-size-fits-all campaigns is over – your campaign tactics should be
customized and meet your people where they are in order to offer them meaningful ways
to get involved.

8. How will you measure effectiveness?

What does success look like for each of your objectives? How will you know if you were
successful?

2. Remember the relationship between online

and offline activities.
The best advocacy campaigns combine the power of online activities
with the potential of offline activities. Both are critical to the success
of your organization’s efforts.

Your online actions won’t be enough to sustain an effective campaign.

Likewise, running a campaign without online assistance is seriously
not advised.

Strike a balance between the two mediums.

You can, for instance, coordinate most of your efforts virtually, but you
might want to supplement your hard work online with an in-person
step that could take your campaign to the next level.

Essentially, the point to emphasize here is that your online and offline
advocacy actions should coexist. The better integrated your work is,
the easier life will be for your team and your supporters.

The best way to balance your online and offline activities? Keep track
of your donors, volunteers, and other supporters in your
constituent database software.

You can use software like this to get an overview of your supporters'
engagement histories, including when and how they give, their
volunteer history, or how they've engaged with your cause online.

Use this comprehensive view of your communities' actions to

determine the right next steps you need to take in your advocacy
campaigns.

3. Consider the impact.

If you don’t know the impact you’re aiming for, how can you expect
supporters to get on board?

Think through the mission of your campaign, and if you’re asking for a
specific action, make sure you know what that act will hopefully
accomplish.
People invested in your cause will want to help, but they’re going to
want to know what they’re doing and why. It’s not an unreasonable
ask.

Evidencing the impact will be especially crucial if you’re asking for an

online action. It’s far easier to convince someone to join in on your
efforts when you can have a genuine face-to-face conversation with
that person.

It’s far harder to establish that kind of credibility with the disconnect
and relative anonymity that the internet culture fosters. That’s why it’s
all the more important that you make your online requests more
trustworthy. To build trust, be transparent about the exact impact
you’re hoping to have.

If your organization has taken similar steps in the past, you can even
bolster confidence with your previous success stories.

You’ll also need to be able to trace a line from the action itself to the
fulfillment of your goal and the service of your cause. Give people a
sample of the micro and the macro as you explain the purpose and
decision behind choosing this particular action.

4. Ensure your action step is front and center.

Providing background information and context is important, but you
also need to make sure you aren’t burying the lead, so to speak.

Give people a step to take.

 Your messaging can get a supporter fired up to join in, so you should
be providing a channel to funnel that enthusiasm — whether that
channel is attending an organizer meeting or signing a petition.

Additionally, your messaging needs to be shareable. If you want your

campaign to grow, it has to appeal to your contact list so much so that
they:

1. Complete your requested action.

2. Pass the details on to their networks.

With the help of the internet, the physical act of spreading the word is
easy-peasy. Don’t let the ease of sharing fool you, though. Your
content has to be worth sharing in the first place. Your
communications need to cut through the clutter that crowds social
media and the internet in general. Reach out and grab the attention of
your potential supporters!

5. Contact in the best way possible.

Part of cutting through the clutter is contacting in the best way
possible. Make a go of reaching your supporters in the exact manner
that they prefer to be reached, which is when they’re most likely to be
responsive.

You can reach out:

 Through email
 On social media
 In person
 On the phone
 Through direct mail
 Don’t let all those options go to waste!

You can optimize your contact method on two fronts:

1. Based on your previous advocacy campaign history.

2. Based on your communication history with contacts.

Based on your Previous Advocacy Campaign History

If you keep track of your communication data, specifically response

rates, you’ll be able to form educated generalizations about the means
of communication that your average supporter responds best to.

For example, if your last campaign yielded tons of response from your
email series, continue down that path the next time around. You can
even dive further into the investigation and see what sorts of emails
were most effective.

Based on your Communication History with Contacts

This step will come with time. You can’t track communication history
with contacts that you don’t have. So, as you build up your support
base, make sure you’re proactive about using your CRM to keep
records of key behaviors.

Then, when you have ample evidence to determine preferences,

leverage that data!

If you have a big supporter pool, you likely won’t be able to take an
approach that is this customized with each contact. You can however,
 segment your supporters who share similar preferences and provide a
reasonable level of personalization.

Additionally, you might want to give added attention to particular

supporters who have the potential to have a major impact on your
campaign, whether they could donate a significant amount or have
connections with the policy makers you’re trying to reach.

For those supporters, you can segment them out and practice
cultivation measures, like arranging an in-person meeting or hosting
an informational luncheon.

Contacting in the best way possible comes down to getting to know

your supporters better and maximizing your efforts.

6. Keep your friends close.

Usually when someone utters the phrase “keep your friends close,” it’s
closely followed by, “and keep your enemies closer.”

This time around, there’s not the second half. Point five is solely about
keeping your friends close. What does that mean for advocacy
campaigns? It means you should be doing all you can to:

 Engage your current supporters.

 Grow your network of advocates.
 Target the right people to help you in your efforts.

In this case, your friends are your supporters, your potential

supporters, and the people you’ll be interacting with and relying on to
help you effect change.
 As far as keeping your supporters and potential supporters close, that
will come down to acknowledging their work, giving them
opportunities they can engage with, and keeping the lines of
communication open.

For the third group, the people in power who can effect change, you’ll
want to make sure you’re reaching out to the right targets and
handling your interactions appropriately. The right target is someone
who is in power and open to what you’re advocating for. If someone is
firmly closed off to what you’re asking, you won’t get anywhere, and
you’ll be wasting your time.

You want a target who can become an ally, not an immovable wall
between your organization and your goal.

7. Be crystal clear.
Transparency is key. You should:

 Emphasize exactly what the action will accomplish — People want to know what they’re
being asked to get involved with, and they want to be able to evaluate the likelihood of
their participation resulting in real, notable outcomes.
 Draft direct messaging — If you’re asking someone to send an email to a member of
Congress, make sure that the wording in the email is persuasive and straightforward. You’ll
also want to ensure those sending the email can take your template and customize it. A
personal touch can go a long way when it comes to getting through to recipients.
 Give a concrete direction: The action you’re requesting of your advocates and the actions
they’re requesting of their various power players have to both be reasonable and concrete.
Someone receiving a request should be able to diagnose exactly what’s being asked of
them.
 Keep people updated: Supporters will want to know the results of their efforts. It’s human
nature. Tell them what has occurred. Show your appreciation for their work. And, offer next
steps if applicable.
Those are just four of the many ways you can be crystal clear. Think
through what your group can do to be as transparent as possible.

8. Continuously grow your supporter list - here

are 9 ways.
Supporters are the lifeblood of any organization, and one way to get
folks actively engaged in your cause is through online actions such as
petitions and targeted actions.

But, here’s the crux – many online actions aren’t effective in achieving
offline results and don’t grow your list. In fact, only about 10 percent
of people complete an online action (like signing a petition). You’re
going to need a lot more than that to bolster your grassroots
campaigning.

How do you make your online actions more effective and grow your
base through your advocacy efforts? Here are 9 tips that can help:

1. Make all actions shareable. We’re all highly influenced by others,

and shifts in public opinion are often tipped by a critical mass of
“easily influenced” individuals. People pretty much do whatever their
friends are doing, which is why your content must to be shareable.

Create customized messages and graphics sized for different social

networks so supporters can easily post them to their networks. (Hint:
A Facebook graphic is 1200 px x 628 px, Instagram is 600 px x 600 px,
and Twitter is 1200 px x 600 px.)
2. Create compelling content. This is key to the success of online
advocacy and should influence your readers – quickly – to care about
your issue, inspire action, and motivate them to share with their
networks. For tips, check out this short video: Content Marketing for
Nonprofits.

3. Online actions need to be credible so that people will take part

and share it with their friends. Don’t just promote actions for the sake
of building a list.

4. Provide sign-up pages. Try to get the contact information of

everyone who takes action and make these calls to action prominent
on your website. Be authentic as you do this: don’t capture names
while masquerading your intentions as something else. Let your
subscribers know what to expect next and how you plan to stay in
touch and use their information.

5. Find and thank your messengers. By this, I mean: find those who
are spreading the word and influencing their profession or
community. Thank them for being an advocate and get to know them,
especially if they are bloggers.

6. “Like” and “Follow”. Again, identify influencers on social media

whether they are influential individuals or targeted groups such as
your local animal group. “Like” them and comment (usefully) on what
they post.

7. Online ads and list-building services. Targeted Facebook and

Google ads, purchased with the right keywords and pointing to an
effective landing page can often inspire strangers to take action and
share their contact information. If you have the budget and have hit a
brick wall with your organic growth, organizations like Change.org and
Care2 can send a targeted message to their supporters on your behalf.

8. Have a rapid response plan in place. Stay on top of current affairs,

and be ready to respond and take advantage of any news that you
can.

9. Cross-promote with other organizations or coalitions. Find like-

minded organizations to send messages on your behalf to their
supporters. The average conversion rate is five percent – not bad!

Advocacy is rooted in an effort to effect change. Take that drive for

change and look inward. Make your organization’s efforts better so
that you can go out and make the world a better place.

STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES OF ADVOCACY

To assist service users, advocacy may be appropriate to protect the rights of the service
user. An advocate will inform an individual of their options, and talk with other services
on their behalf, if required to. The role of an advocate is to allow the service user to
make their own self-determinations by ensuring they have all the relevant information,
whilst at the same time not imposing their own views on the situation (Coulshed and
Orme 1998).

Difficulties with advocacy arise if the advocate tries to impose their own opinion on the
service user, who may be vulnerable, and open to suggestion. The lack of statutory
advocacy means that most services are provided by those who have already experienced
similar situations, and who may have a biased view or are not trained to deal with
difficult situations (Adams et.al. 2002)

Anti oppressive practice (AOP): Looking at the structure of oppression developed by

Thompson (1993) called the PCS model. I can illustrate how oppression is occurring,
because this model is used to ‘develop our understanding of discrimination and the
oppression that arises from it’. (Thompson,1998:12). It operates at three very separate
levels, which are inter-related. These levels being personal, cultural and structural ‘(the
term PCS model)’. (Thompson,1998:12).

‘Oppression itself is a powerful force. On a personal level it can lead to demoralisation

and lack of self-esteem, while at a structural level it can lead to denial of rights’.

(Dalrymple and Burke,1995:57)

This statement proves to be true because at the personal level, because the majority of
the community that come to our organisation are feeling oppressed by themselves
because of not being able to access facilities and not receiving the advice in maintaining
their health, hygiene and environment.

At the cultural level oppression is coming from other communities because they feel
that they are superior to them, due to the fact that they are more familiar with the
services and maybe able to speak English, therefore demoralising the community .

At the structural level, institutions such as schools, hospitals, social security offices,
advice centres the list is endless do not provide a facility whereby individuals from the
community can access them, whereby denying them their rights.

As an advocate it was my duty to challenge what the service users where feeling and
going through, whereby I would empower them to access necessary services and direct
them to attend relevant courses in order to tackle there problems and emotional
feelings.

Print Resources
 Advocacy and Campaigning Course Toolkit (INTRAC). This online PDF provides
theoretical and practical information for advocating and establishing a positive
campaign.
 Advocacy Toolkit (International Competition Network). The purpose of this toolkit is
twofold: (1) Share and disseminate alternative approaches to advocacy across
competition agencies; and (2) Provide a useful, practical guide to competition agencies
looking to amend or refresh their current approach.
 Altman, D., Fawcett, S., Seekins, T., & Young, J. (1994). Public Health Advocacy:
Creating Community Change to Improve Health. Stanford Center for Research in
Disease Prevention. Palo Alto,CA.
 Article: Community Health Advocacy (U.S. National Library of Medicine). Loue, S.
(2006). Community health advocacy. Journal of Epidemiology & Community Health,
60(6), 458-463. This article addresses six key questions about advocacy and highlights
the foundational issues of advocating for community health.
 Avner, M., & Smucker, B. (2002). The lobbying and advocacy handbook for nonprofit
organizations: Shaping public policy at the state and local level. Amherst H. Wilder
Foundation. This book offers a clear step-by-step guide to implementing a successful
advocacy program at both the state and local levels.
 Bobo, K., Kendall, J., Max, S.(1991) Organizing for Social Change: a manual for
activists in the 1990s. Minneapolis, MN. Midwest Academy.
 10 Common Elements of Successful Advocacy Campaigns (PDF). This freely accessible
PDF is Chapter 6 from the Lobbying Strategy Handbook. This particular chapter
discusses steps 4-7 in the list of ten.
 Community Health Advocates (from Community Health Advocates website) is a health
portal to advocates who work to help their communities get, keep, and use health
coverage. Through the portal, there is access to several publications designed to educate
advocates and consumers on gaining health coverage.
 Daly, J. (2012). Advocacy: Championing ideas and influencing others. New Haven, CT:
Yale University Press. Practical knowledge for transforming advocacy ideas into
practice are provided, emphasizing the power of action-oriented marketing. Daly draws
off of current research in the fields of persuasion, power relations, and behavior change
to explain how to successfully advocate for a cause.
 How - and Why - to Influence Public Policy. (1996). Community Change. 17, 1-40.
 How to Run an Online Advocacy Campaign (Network for Good Website). On this
webpage, a blueprint is provided for designing and running an online advocacy
campaign.
 Libby, P. (2011). The lobbying strategy handbook: 10 steps to advancing any cause
effectively. SAGE Publications, Inc.This book provides a 10-step framework that walks
readers step-by-step through the elements of a lobbying campaign. Three separate case
studies are used to show how groups have successfully employed the model.
 Sen, R. (2003). Stir it up: Lessons in community organizing and advocacy. Jossey-Bass;
1st Edition. Sen goes step-by-step through the process of building and mobilizing a
community and implementing key strategies to affect social change. Using case studies to
illustrate advocacy practices, Sen provides tools to help groups tailor his model for their
own organizational needs.
 Understanding Advocacy (Article from International Water and Sanitation Centre (IRC))
provides basic information about communication, action, and goals as they pertain to
advocacy.