Episode 12 - Full Transcript

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Welcome to the show

Tim Beynon: Hello and welcome to the Charity Show, the podcast for charity insiders by charity insiders. Please rate, follow or subscribe to us on your usual podcast platform. And here's what's coming up in episode twelve.

Piers Townley: I think this is quite the shocking statistic. If you believe we're a nation of pet lovers that are leading animal rescue Charity, cats protection. It's found that in the first seven months of this year alone, abandoned cat cases of sort of 30%.

Adeela Warley: And I think since Elon Musk took over, Twitter and turned it into x, there have been rising concerns about the lack of investment in content moderation, how the algorithms are working to promote the worst aspects of humanity, about safeguarding the users on your platform and tackling misinformation. And Elon Musk's personal posts on the platform, have really driven some very, very divisive things, and not just in the online space, but with quite devastating real world, consequences.

Tim Beynon: Organiser Michelle Oldfield rallied her community to take part in a photo shoot for the cheeky 2025 calendar. the months feature more than 30 people and capture the stunning beauty of the veil of Belvoir, the stunning beauty of other aspects as well, I imagine, and has so far raised 2000 pounds for breast cancer now and prostate Cancer UK.

Piers Townley: If my fundraising team suggests such a thing like that, then I will definitely be politely declining that one.

Tim Beynon: What month would you choose, mister M?

Piers Townley: September. Also. Never going to happen. No. Never going to happen.

Welcome to Ep.12

Tim Beynon: Hello and welcome to episode twelve of the Charity show with me, Tim Beynon head of marketing engagement at the Fire Fighters Charity.

Piers Townley: And me Piers Townley PR manager at the Brain Tumour Charity.

Tim Beynon: So what's been going on, Piers? What's your last fortnight look like?

Piers Townley: It's actually been a weird kind of forward planning moment, for the Charity. We're actually looking now to March 2025. But March is the Brain Tumour Charity is kind of hero awareness month. It's officially known as the Brain Tumour awareness month, so it's BTAM for short. And during that we have our twilight war, which is a bit of a kind of a hero campaign, a fundraiser awareness for us. Everyone in the community comes together, we do it ten k and a five k, walk around the location. And since COVID we've had to scale back and just focus on being in London. But this will be the third year that we're in London. So the twilight walkers, we've been building all the materials, all the comms, all the, engagement and the segmentation over on our email journeys. And that's just launched today, actually. So the two weeks before this or actually more than two weeks before this, all the teams have been building up. And as a comms team, as a pr team, we're kind of on the periphery at the moment. We will start stepping up our involvement. Yeah. Busy, but also that kind of. Okay. We're looking now six months in advance and other things beyond Christmas, which is kind of a disjointed, but it's just the way all charities work, isn't it? I guess so. You've been the same.

Tim Beynon: Yeah. It's funny you talk about twilight, twilight walk. I can't help but think of the do gooders show, which we, Garrett was on a couple of weeks back, and obviously the, the tiki torch walk that went terribly wrong. But, yeah, yours is not going to go wrong. You're not going to have the police chase you and all that kind of stuff.

Piers Townley: There's no tiki torches. There won't be more warning. Hordes of tiki wielding supporters.

Tim Beynon: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Same for us, really. Here at the firefighter strategy, there's lots going on as ever and forward planning again. And Christmas seems to be forefront of everyone's mind at the moment. So we're talking about all the things we've got coming up for Christmas and then looking ahead to January as well. And it's funny how you got to really start thinking about those January deadlines and getting things to the printers in time because things close down over Christmas and so on and so forth. So everything becomes a little bit kind of, geez, you've got to think about, take that Christmas break into account and think ahead. So I'm still in denial that it's happening at all. I'm so massively unprepared for it. Personally, I haven't even thought about it. I do know people. I don't know, where you sit, on this issue, Piers. People who've done their shopping and wrapped it and stuff already. That's alien to me completely. Shopping is something that happens in December, not in, not in October.

Piers Townley: As unnamed member of my family was boasting how they bought some of their Christmas stuff last year in the sales and they're very, very pleased with themselves that it's like I'm like I'm literally just waiting until I get through to the weekend at the moment, let alone in six weeks time.

Tim Beynon: Whenever that Amazon Prime Day is, just blitz it on that one day. Get everything sent. That's, the, that's the mission. So I must ask you, though, before we get onto charity related stuff, as someone who has a young dog like I do, I'm really, really struggling to stop my dog from digging up the garden. This puppy, almost six months, is basically turned our garden into, like, the som. It's insane, the amount of digging. Do you have any tips? Any tips to stop a dog from digging up your garden?

Piers Townley: No is the answer. But you get so much unsolicited advice. I think it's probably like having kids. It's like having pets. Everyone's got a solution, everyone's got an idea.

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Piers Townley: Do they work? I don't know. It's just trial and error, right?

Tim Beynon: I want to hear from all this. I want to hear from all those Charity, animal Charity people out there. What are their tips for stopping a dog from digging up the garden? Because it's driving us insane.

Piers Townley: Back to your dog's hand. Give us a shout. What can you do? How can you help?

Tim Beynon: Absolutely.

Shining a spotlight on the ethics of social media

This week, though, we're shining a spotlight on the ethics of social media. and it's fantastic to have our guest, Adila Worley, CEO of the fantastic Charity comms, on the show a little bit later, working in comms biz, and it's part of our daily lives. Of course, social media can't escape it. But how do you personally feel about it? You know, work aside, how do you feel about the whole social media thing?

Piers Townley: It's tricky, isn't it? Because I think, I mean, I'm of the agent. I think you are, Tim, as well. Where we weren't digital natives when it comes to social media, we've had to learn at speed in our roles and our various careers, and now it sits at forefront of, I think, of what we do as a comms team. I mean, we have a brilliant social media team, a lot younger than me, a brilliant social media team with the Brain Tumour Charity, and they're all over the channels that we use. But it's interesting to find which social media works with different segments of our supporters. So our Facebook, for example, our Facebook groups, they're closed. And they're still a really big part of what we do as our comms and our outreach towards our supporters. Our social media team are doing things on Insta and TikTok that I think is just largely witchcraft. So for me, it's been a really interesting and essential part of what we do as comms. Part of my role is to look after our celebrities. I do a lot of direct messaging with them that could be over one insta. It could even still be on x. so, yes, I'm happy to learn. I'm happy to use it as part of my armoury.

Tim Beynon: Yeah, I think. I agree. I think we're at risk of standing like grumpy old men here, I think, because we're of a certain age where there's a whole generation, after us who are much more au fait with social media than we are. But, yeah, so I feel increasingly out of touch with it, I must admit. and the scene, the stuff which my kids watch and the stuff that they engage with on social media, it's way out there. I am quite impressed by some of the high production values of some of the stuff that gets churned out. It's quite impressive to see the amount of stuff that is produced and also the quality of stuff that's produced and how easy it is to create really high quality content. I think that's really fascinating, really interesting. But no, I am definitely out of touch.

Piers Townley: It's also interesting to me. Is it? People say, oh, yeah, we do social media, or I do social media, and that is like you do social media, but actually, when you get into it, it's a highly specialised and increasingly so. It's not just about churning out content, it's what we've had to do it with, the Charity show, it's the scheduling, it's the timing, it's the analytics, the metrics behind it, it's the trend spotting and responding to that.

Tim Beynon: Yeah, it's interesting to see how that will evolve. Wonder what influence AI will have on social as well. It has been fascinating to see the amount of content and AI generated, content that's been churned out in America at the moment as a result of the us election. And also, the other thing that kind of scares me a bit about social media is how the algorithms work. Again, this is wishcraft, in terms of fact, that you could be looking at something on to buy on Amazon, and all of a sudden you jump on Twitter or Facebook, whatever, and you're being shown ads and content relating to the thing you were looking at on a completely separate platform. That kind of stuff really sort of blows my mind in terms of how that works. And then it worries me as a parent in terms of the amount of doom scrolling that kids are never to be do when they're on social and the kind of things that they're being shown and they're being seen again, those algorithms are just chucking stuff at them that they might not, that the big computers in the sky think that they want to see, but it might not be appropriate at, all. So that really terrifies me.

Piers Townley: It's an emerging thing, isn't it? And the generation they're dealing with now, are, ah, the canaries in the mine really, to see what happens with it.

This week's third sector news

Tim Beynon: Right then, let's take a look at some third sector news. What jumps out at you on your social feed this week, piers?

Piers Townley: So on the back of the news we featured about dogs and animal charities in a very recent episode of the show, is to do with the increasing number of older dogs being given up and the charities having to respond to this. This time, for me, more animals. But it's all about cats now. I'm a reluctant adult person. I had to bow to the pressure from my kids over the years. But I think this is quite the shocking statistic, if you believe we're a nation of pet lovers, that a leading animal rescue Charity, cats protection, it's found that in the first seven months of this year alone, abandoned cat cases have sort of 30%. Last year they said they helped around 184,000 moggies, which is about 500 a day. So really, the demand for these charities, these animal charities has gone through the roof and they've cited in their reports the pandemic lockdown boom for cats and dog ownership is hit bust, they say. So the cat protection has said that, increasing vet bills, cost of living, prioritising household budgets, all of this has fed into this crisis, as they've called it. And a great piece of research they've done, which is a bit of genius in the title as well.

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Piers Townley: It's called cats and their stats. And this piece of research found that one in three cat owners feel greatly impacted, is the quote, by current financial climate, 18%, which is a lot of people are, cutting back on vital vet services such as vaccinations. This has drawn the RSPCA into the problem as well. And they're urging people to adopt rather than buying a pet, saying that research centres are, quote, drowning in animals. And of course, the RSPCA and our, connections on that Charity will feature in upcoming episodes of the show. But it starts figures all around, whether you're a cat or adult person.

The Prince's Trust is rebranded as The King's Trust

Tim, something that jolt out at me this week. What about you?

Tim Beynon: News that I spotted this week, I think, something that really, really stood out for me, because I love a bit of brand branding, and obviously we've talked a lot about brand on the show before, but this is a royal rebrand, so this is rebrand on a whole other level. So it's a great story. So this is a story about rebranding. Everyone's probably aware of this already, but the prince's trust is rebranded as the king's trust for obvious reasons. and you know, this is a big deal, logo change, name change and everything that goes with it. But the man who's done it, James Somerville OBE, did, it on a pro bono basis, because he himself, was a former beneficiary of the prince's trust. I think that's just a really nice story. So this chapter, James Somerville OBE, and he's very famous in the design world. I'll just read you a little bit of his background here. So he is one of more than 1.3 million people who have been supported by the now Kings Trust, around the world today. He co founded his first design agency, Attic, with the support and a grant from the trust in the UK in 1986 when he was a 19 year old street artist in Huddersfield. Since then, he's gone on to achieve amazing, success. he's become one of the UK's most respected or his firm has become one of the UK's most respected design firms. Bought out by a, japanese company in 2007, he went on to become vice president of global design at Coca Cola. You don't get bigger than that, really, in terms of design jobs. And he now lives, in, Atlanta, Georgia, and is a patron of the trust as well. And he's given back by rebranding them as the king's trust. and that's an amazing story, for them, I just think a really nice story all round, and a great bit of branding. So the prince's trust is now the king's trust. So that was something that jumped out to me.

Invisible chips

And the other one, the other story, that's a cracker for two reasons. Firstly, the story, the title of the story, invisible chips, that's a great story. Caught my eyes straight away. And it's basically, a restaurant in Amesbury. Portions are giving away portions, or actually rather not giving away. Customers are buying portions of invisible chips in, order to raise money, for a hospitality action, a Charity, that looks after the hospitality sector. So diners, choosing to buy invisible chips for two pounds, to the catering industry Charity, which supports anyone working in the hotels and catering industry in their time of need. And the other reason this jumped out to me, this story is the chief operating officer, is a guy called Adam Charity. What awesome name, but brilliant name. So two reasons, yeah, brilliant, Adam. Charity doing fantastic Charity work. So well done, Adam. You're living up to your name there. Awesome work. So, yeah, there you go, two cracking stories this week.

Piers Townley: I expect someone to come up with invisible mushy peas next. Let's crack on with the Friday night dinner. Being invisible and charitable, I'd give to.

Tim Beynon: Charity and take actual mushy peas. Love mushy peas.

The problem with X

Two years ago, Elon Musk bought Twitter for a staggering $44 billion, soon thereafter dropping its familiar bluebird logo and rebranding it as x. Since then, though, the platform has been undergoing a transformation. 80% of its workforce has been cut, content moderation rules have been relaxed, new features have been introduced and charges applied. The result, according to many commentators and critics, is that x has today become a hotbed for misinformation and hate, with an increase in engagement with extreme content mirrored by, a decrease in engagement with fact checkers and less biassed media. So where does all this leave charities today? A strong social media presence is vital to most charities comms plans. It's something we're all very familiar with, allowing them to engage directly with their beneficiaries and supporters. But our charities now facing an ethical dilemma when it comes to X. Adila Warley, CEO of Charity Comms, thinks they are. And the membership organisation for Charity Communications professionals has consequently scaled back its activity on X as a result. Others, meanwhile, like Akivo, have withdrawn from X completely, stating that it no longer aligns to their organisational values. Is this a turning point for charities in terms of their use of social media? What are the implications for comms teams, and does this now open the door for new emerging social media technologies? We sat down with a dealer recently to find out.

Welcome - Adeela Warley, Chief Executive, Charity Comms

Adida, great to see you. Thank you for joining us here on the Charity show. It's lovely

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to welcome you onto the show. As comms guys, ourselves, piers and myself, we're very familiar with Charity comms and big fans of all that you do, so it's fantastic to welcome you onto the show today.

Adeela Warley: Thank you very much for having me.

Tim Beynon: No, absolute pleasure. And I suppose that's one of the reasons why we were really fascinated, because we are comms guys ourselves, about charityCom's decision to kind of scale back your activity on X. It's something that seems to be in the news quite a lot recently. But tell us a bit about, why you decided to scale back, and why now?

Adeela Warley: So, like most charities, we monitor our social media channels regularly. That's a job that's never done right. And this analysis informs our wider social, media strategy. And after some really thought provoking discussions with the team, with our trustees, we decided to scale back activity on X. And we were on a journey like many other organisations and we'd already started to think about a new social media strategy and to try and align it with our organisational ambitions. And so we were reviewing also our channel insights, how were our channels performing? And the changes on X have given us more momentum, I suppose, to make that decision and to scale back and actually invest our resources in a more dynamic approach to social media. So we're going to keep monitoring X, for ourselves, and for the sector, and we'll continue to support our community who are struggling with some of these choices themselves.

The question of withdrawing from X completely

Tim Beynon: Sure. And when you were having those discussions, you were talking about what steps to take was the prospect of withdrawing from X completely on the table. Was that something that you discussed?

Adeela Warley: Yeah, yes it was. but we decided that it was actually important to, for now, to still put some time into being on that channel. Many of our members are still there and we have a role in seeing what they're up to, helping to be their champion, spreading messages about their campaigns and their asks. But it's also a place where we track what's going on in the sector. It's the place for breaking news. So those things are still quite important to us and so that's why we haven't chosen to completely leave the platform for now. I mean this is a really, really live issue for so many organisations and I think that's what's prompted you maybe to ask to have a chat about it because we've seen certainly in the sector price lots of charities adopting a whole spectrum of positions. and that's right, because I really feel that there isn't one solution that fits all that. That definitely isn't the approach. And it's interesting, I think over the summer when there was so much unrest in the country, many charities took to their social media channels and they did so in order to really champion the communities that were being targeted by hate to communicate really powerful counter narratives. and I was really struck by the fundraising that went on. I think I'm sure you'll remember that Citizens Advice office in Sunderland was vandalised and there was a fundraising effort on social media to help repair the damage. So I think all of that shows just how social media continues to be a part of most charities toolkit. And I think communicators at the moment are really on the front line. They're being asked to advise their CEO's, their trustees, also staff and volunteers in their organisation about what they should do. And because of that, we wanted to support them. And we held a recent social media event which created a safe place to reflect and to share their thought processes of what was going on for them. And we found some really, we discovered some really, important take home messages and I'll talk to you a bit about those now. So the first thing was that charities, I said that there's no one size fits all, and that's because charities need to start with their mission. What do they exist to achieve? Who do they need to reach and engage to drive the change that they're there to achieve? So keep the mission in mind, also to be really data driven, because I know from talking to people that it's all too easy to be caught in the middle, in a crossfire of different people's opinions and assumptions or their personal values that they bring to work and to their jobs. So really, drawing on the analytics, what your performance KPI's are showing you is really important and to think about your organisational strategy. As I've said, the other thing was

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Adeela Warley: very much about ways of working. so it was about making space in your organisation and time for really open and honest discussion. because it isn't a yes no answer, it really is nuanced. And so creating the space to do that was really important. And we know that social media managers, they're kind of having to, they're on that, always on, culture. And so just please support those teams and be kind and understand that they've got an awful lot on their plate. And I think from our learning, we found that with a really clear definition of both what your charity's voice is and a definition of what each channel does for you, you can be confident, I think, that you can bring your audiences together for connection and to take action with you in the spaces that work best for you. So I think that's what we were learning, really, from listening to our community.

Piers Townley: That's fascinating stuff, Adila. I think this is the first time the spotlight has had to go onto a channel as well, isn't it? We're all fairly new to this. We're all learning at speed. It's the first time that for a variety of reasons, X has come under scrutiny and, teams and charities are having to, like, you know, decide whether they want to use it. I mean, as the Brain Tumour Charity. We're finding several of our, high profile celebrities, for example, they're just withdrawing themselves off. So that led us to then talk to our teams and get our teams together and say, well, what should we do with X and how should we do it? And again, it's a constant monitoring of it. But I know that other charities are actually leaving the platform altogether. The likes of Race Equality foundation and Colchester and Ipswich hospitals Charity. Are you surprised that charities are withdrawing from Exxon? Do you think this will gain momentum in the future?

Adeela Warley: I'm not surprised, because we've walked that journey as well. So, no, not surprised. I think people are rightly calling for greater accountability from social media companies, by better moderation and responsibility from the owners themselves. And I think since Elon Musk took over, Twitter and turned it into x, there have been rising concerns about the lack of investment in content moderation, how the algorithms are working to promote the worst aspects of humanity, about safeguarding the users on your platform and tackling misinformation. And Elon Musk's personal posts on the platform have really driven some very, very divisive things, and not just in the online space, but with quite devastating real world, consequences. One point that our community have made really boldly to us is that, X is not Twitter, that the platform has fundamentally declined and many of their supporters are voting with their feet as well. But what I would say is, I think, the glass half full in me is saying that these issues have helped to create a space for innovation to thrive and that, the disruption in the tech marketplace is creating new platforms, ah, that are emerging. And, this is giving audiences more options and a possibility of something else. And I think while none of us can, we've not got a crystal ball, we can't predict what will happen with social media. I think that I take heart that people power can help reclaim social media for the better. It can be a space where people come together to make, positive change in the world, so people can still influence the future of social media.

Tim Beynon: I think that's your point there. Around owners is a really interesting one, because these aren't, necessarily organisations that, are managed by a big board of directors or a big board of, trustees, making sure the decisions are, made, in a certain way. This is an organisation, next is an audition that can be fundamentally impacted by one man's tweets, whatever, I don't know if they're called tweets anymore, whatever. They're called one man's posts from one day to the next. And that's, as you say, that's exactly what we're seeing. but at the same time, divisive content and misinformation is not something that's unique to x, is it? Something does span platforms as a whole. So why do you think, is it, do you think, do you. We believe actually that it is because of those outside influences. Things like, Musk buying Twitter, and then also things like Musk aligning himself, and where he stands in the US election, for example, helping to generate some of that content. And therefore, x is beginning to stand in isolation to the others in terms of the amount and volume of this kind of divisive content.

Adeela Warley: I agree, I totally agree with what you said. I think that is the reason that's driving this in particular around that platform. But we know that all social medias have

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Adeela Warley: their downside, and that's why there's been a really positive move to bring in the, online safety bill, now an act, and we will see how that really does influence the regulation of, the platforms themselves. And the tech giants, now, the owners of those platforms in hm truth, are becoming more powerful, powerful than traditional editors of newspapers. So we do need to have individual responsibility as well as policies that govern the platforms themselves.

New social media channel checklist for charities

Tim Beynon: And you mentioned earlier on, as well, about the importance of protecting those social media teams. And there's people whose job it is, it's not an easy job to monitor what goes on across the multiple platforms that most charities are on these days. What would your advice be? Or how does Charity comms, how can Charity comms support Charity? To help those teams, to help those individuals, to do that on a day to day basis.

Adeela Warley: So we provide, a lot of, information and resources, whether that's best practise guides or templates, or the latest thinking through blogs. And all of that can be had on our, social media hub. So that's a brilliant place for people to start out. But we've recognised that this whole issue has, the charities need more support. And so we're creating a new social media channel checklist, and, we're going to be releasing that really soon, in the next couple of days. And what that's going to do is it's going to provide a structured way for charities to have that conversation. The questions they need to ask, the challenges that they need to make internally so they can go through the checklist. And, that will help them to tailor, their own social media decisions and strategy in the longer term. So I'd really encourage people to have a look at that. We've had a wonderful expert working with, us on it and I think it's going to be a really helpful resource, not just for our members, for the sector more widely.

Tim Beynon: I think that sounds fascinating. I think it'd be really interesting to see how teams can use that. I think some of the challenges facing comes to teams and social media teams is how they then potentially have those conversations with their senior leadership teams, just because they're seeing it much more out of the cold face on a day to day basis. Senior leadership team will be one step removed, perhaps so helping teams have those conversations with their senior leaders will be really important.

Piers Townley: And Adeela, charity comms mentions in the statement that they're, excuse me, ploughing their energies into wider social media strategy in new and exciting ways. Can you expand a little bit on this? And what are the things that be taking into account as part of this project, this ongoing project?

Adeela Warley: We have a really small comms team at Charity comms. Believe it or not, we're a tiny but mighty team. And so, like many small teams, we have to make strategic choices about where we invest our skills and our energy. and we're thinking a lot about how we can innovate, and this includes with our content and where that content is best placed to reach and inspire and engage our audience. And we found that LinkedIn has been a growing platform, for us and we want to invest more time here to actually build conversations and communities. And we feel that this just absolutely makes sense for us. So that's the shift that we're making at the moment.

Piers Townley: Excellent. That's interesting. We had this conversation offline, Tim and I, when, we launch the podcast and ongoing, when we're monitoring our, social media presence and working out, where do we place our efforts, it's a challenge and it's really interesting to then to keep on, to keep 1ft in front of the other when you are, looking at all these different.

Tim Beynon: Channels, just to interject. I'd agree completely that LinkedIn seems to be the place where, as a sector, we're having those conversations. So it seems to be the place where that kind of safe space, if you'd like for us to have, for the sector as a whole, to have.

Adeela Warley: Those kind of conversations, dare I say it, podcasts. We're on a podcast, and that is a brilliant place for really, thoughtful, conversation out of the kind of reactive space, but a place for reflection and exchange of ideas. And I saw a wonderful, roundup by, Madeleine Sugden, who's in our community as well. Freelancer of all the podcasts are out there. So, yeah, yay, podcasts.

Piers Townley: We'll take that. Onwards and upwards.

Testing new emerging platforms

Where do you stand on emerging platforms such as the likes of Blue sky and some further ones that are going to be in there in the future?

Adeela Warley: We are watching with great interest blue sky. Many of our members are already there and, we've been asked whether we're going to join. And again, it's a question of resource, isn't it? We will really keep monitoring it and if it looks like it's going to offer the sector and us a place, then we'll be there. But I think it's test and learn at the moment.

Piers Townley: Yeah, I think you can feel that, can't you? In other charities and other comms teams that we talk to or interact with, they're all keeping an eye on, what is emerging and where is the best use of,

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Piers Townley: as you say, often limited resources and smaller teams?

Adeela Warley: Yeah, I mean, two, these are small teams there, slightly larger charities, but we've had presentations and talks with RSPB and the National Trust and they have been experimenting. So RSPB have been using TikTok really effectively and they found that that has brought them more of the Gen Z generation. and the National Trust have been experimenting with threads as a place not for campaigning, not for push broadcast communications, but for engagement and fun, not to talk about scones. As you can imagine, they're really good examples of how charities are testing and learning and exploring the ecosystem of social media options available to them, but for good strategic reasons.

Piers Townley: Now we're seeing some of that at the Brain dream of Charity. The last six months has seen us, not me personally, a social media team. For me, it's largely witchcraft, but they've been exploring TikTok as well and we found a great deal of engagement, as you say, with, the younger audience to spread our campaigning, spread our work. But I can see it in the comm scene when I'm sitting next, I'm doing social media team. Is that very much that test and learn? It's like treading, just seeing what happens and then reporting back and obviously then reporting back to the wider Charity as a whole, especially SLTs and CEO's,

Adeela Warley: Internal comms is such an important part of the piece.

Tim Beynon: I've been enjoying the TikTok trends for the Gen Z, write the scripts for charities and, full of the kind of language that my kids talk and nothing to do. Just talking about blue sky, though. Do you think that possibly this might be the time for emerging smaller tech companies to get a bigger slice of the pie, as it were? Because is there perhaps a bit of a fear or a scepticism about the motives behind the tech giants, the xs and the metas of this world?

Adeela Warley: Yeah, definitely. And, you know, when you look back at when Twitter started, I think that was more of the ethos, wasn't it? It was much more progressive and community minded and it's obviously, things do change. So I think you've definitely got something there.

Other challenges charities are facing with social media

Tim Beynon: and just looking at the social media landscape in sort of broader terms, what are some of, sort of, some of the other challenges you're perhaps seeing or that you're, aware of in the Charity conference is helping charities with at the moment? Is there things like perhaps an over dependence on social media as a comms tool? Is the balance right amongst charity comms team in terms of how much weight they put on social media? What are some of those other sort of challenges you're seeing on?

Adeela Warley: Well, we've touched on one already, actually, which is about leadership. So the, Charity Digital skills report this year highlighted the need for trustees and senior teams to enrich their understanding of how digital works, because that is absolutely crucial in underpinning reputation management, managing risk for your organisation and also supporting your social media teams, understanding the challenges they face and the choices that they're having to make. So I think that is a recurring theme that we hear from art, from professional comms people. The second is being time poor. This is just such a beating drum at the moment that teams are incredibly stretched. and, you know, monitoring social media and testing and learning. Both things we've just talked about, they take time. And so I think permissioning teams to have that time and space to go to events, to do training, and, do networking, that time is well invested. It will really repay you if you invest in it. So those were two themes that I think, are broader digital social media than social media trends.

Tim Beynon: Do you think as well, that for some charities that social media can perhaps paint a bit of a misleading picture in regards to some engagement and support? I think the old chestnut likes do not necessarily lead to donations. I can and ask charities, perhaps putting too much, emphasis on social at the expense, maybe some of the more traditional media, some direct mail, or obviously that's much more expensive, but there's sort of more traditional forms of comms.

Adeela Warley: I think charities have always had to have a really diverse portfolio of tools and tactics, both online and offline. And one of the things from a comms professional perspective that Covid taught us is that we have to have the ability to rapidly, rapidly flex and we had to flex away from real world activity to online activity. And that pendulum is swinging back and you only have to look at things like challenge events. They're really on the up. So I think that flexibility, to respond to the external environment as well as

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Adeela Warley: to technology sits at the heart of really effective communications. We definitely need to move away from vanity metrics, as you mentioned. And I think that the only way to do that is to have complete clarity about which channels you're using and why, which audiences you need to talk to and what you want them to do with you, and then be able to monitor the impact, of those channels in delivering those things for you. And so it's about setting measurable and meaningful KPI's, and ones that you can not just track, but you can actually use to change what you're doing. So they're actionable, tracking measures and I'll mention Charity comms's digital benchmark. So this is a tool that is run by us for a tech company, called Uprise up. And what it does is it allows charities to monitor, all their digital performance, KPI's, but not only their own performance, but to look at how they're doing within the sector. So, yeah, that's a really good tool, for helping charities to, you know, understand what's going on and make good choices.

Piers Townley: So great scientists and methods and tools that the chad skills in the wider world at the moment, obviously, we'd agree real when the podcast comes out entering the election.

Dealing with misinformation

So misinformation is going to be the buzzword, and it has been for a long, long time. We recently had Saskia Konenberg, from NCBO, came on the show and she said that charities should, quote, verify information, train their teams, deal with misinformation quickly and report misleading or fake contact, efficiently. So is this issue about training or retraining social teams to be more aware of misinformation out there?

Adeela Warley: Well, really great advice from Saskia, who happens to be a trustee at charity comms. So definitely follow that advice. And I do think that training and the ability to be responsive is very much part of the answer here. But I think it's also really important to be aware of the best practise and insights when it comes to how you deal with misinformation. So we work quite regularly with frameworks UK. and they have got, they've talked a lot to our communities about the dangers of myth busting. It can backfire things that you're actually trying to get rid of. By talking and leading your communications on those facts and figures, you can actually reinforce them and embed even more. So, do take a look at frameworks UK. They've got some fantastic guidelines about the top, top tips of how to if you are going to do myth busting, how to avoid the traps. And then the other thing I'd say is we have a social media policy template which is really, really helpful and I think the Charity commission have been happy to promote it as well to the sector. and just bookmark our social media to help, because that's where you can get the latest news and opinions, on coping with all of these challenges.

Piers Townley: Because I think especially, say if you were a new member to a Charity and a new member to a social team, it would be, seems quite daunting, wouldn't it? You have this skillset in terms of you're able to do social content and, you know, all the analytics and stuff. But actually then to be the voice of a charity on a social media platform must be quite a terrifying experience. Perhaps, you know, when you're first getting into it. So a good signpost there as well. Definitely want to fan the flames, all the misinformation. That's why, as you say, with the myth busting, it can backfire, can't it?

Adeela Warley: It can backfire and I think, you know, it can be a lonely job. So my message is just don't try and go it alone. Reach out and use people like charity comms and connect with your peers because they can share their experiences and you can learn from each other. That's what it can be about.

Piers Townley: Yeah, that's a good bit of advice because obviously our social team for our charities sit very close to the PR team. So the comms, so we get it. There's a lot of internal work that they have to do to then justify and explain what they do to SLT or to trustees or to extended teams. So yeah, there's a bit of a minefield I think, at times for them it is.

Adeela Warley: And I think. So we support not just external communications teams, but internal communications communications team is one of the strongest special interest group that we have and we see the charities where internal comms works really closely alongside external comms team, that is the key to success. I'll tell you. A charity that does it so brilliantly is the RNLI. they just are so aligned and internal comms teams, they set the tone for the internal culture and they can make sure that

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Adeela Warley: all those internal stakeholders, your volunteers, your staff, your donors, all of those people are on the same page. Not just that they're on the inside track, that they know what you're going to say almost before you said it.

Charity Comms Inspiring Communicator Awards

Piers Townley: Moving away from that minefield then for a moment, Adila, we'd like to ask you about the, charity comms inspiring communicator awards. Tell us a little bit more about them because I think the deadline is just closed by the time the show goes out. But what am I there about?

Adeela Warley: So, it's one of the happiest times of my year. I absolutely love the inspiring communicators awards. And really this is about celebrating, those whose services to charity communications really go above and beyond and it highlights people who particularly demonstrate spirit and insight and skill, and above all are, ah, able to inspire others to get involved. So yeah, the nominations are open until the 21 October. so yeah, that's what we're doing with the Charity comms awards this year.

Tim Beynon: It's exciting stuff and as I remember rightly from look at the website, Vicky Beavers, who was on the show, a few episodes back from the sleep Charity, I think she won your strategic leader of the year awards last year. The incredible work she does with the sneak charity, she is fantastic. And I believe she's on the judging panel this time around as well. Tell us a little bit about the panel. Who's going to be judging the winners?

Adeela Warley: Well, we have lots of categories, so we have quite a few judges, so I don't think you'll want me to read them all off. But what I will tell you is that we've got the panel is made up of nine of last year's winners from those categories and then six of Charity comms own trusted. So that's the judging panel.

Tim Beynon: Fantastic. And Wednesday, where are the awards themselves?

Adeela Warley: Well, we are again, we're innovating. So we will be doing an online screening event using LinkedIn and that is going to be on the 4 December from eleven till 1215. And there'll be more information about that on our website. And this year we're really keen to tell the stories, behind the scenes of why our, winners have won in their category, what skills, what lessons they can share with the sector. so we're really delighted to be investing more in that backstage storytelling.

Piers Townley: Stories are key. Aren't they always?

Adeela Warley: Yes.

Piers Townley: Well, thank you so much Adida, for joining us and you've given us so much future thought on so many things, not let alone, you know, just x as a platform and all the very best for the awards. We'll be watching and hopefully speaking to some of the US in due course. But thank you so much for your time.

Adeela Warley: Thank you so much Tim and piers. I've really enjoyed it.

Piers Townley: In each episode of the Charity show we want to celebrate our sector superstars, those incredible people working, volunteering and fundraising across our sector. And you can nominate your deserving colleagues, volunteers or fundraisers, just email us and@thecharityshowpodmail.com or get in touch through the links in the show notes. You can even send us a voice message that we can play out in the next episode. Who's your superstar this week, Ted?

Cheeky charity calendar for 2025

Tim Beynon: Okay, my superstar this week is a lady called Michelle Oldfield. and this is a story about a calendar and it's not, it's not something new. We've all heard of these kind of charity calendars in the past, but this is a, ah, community sports group which is posed for a Charity calendar that captures the beauty of an area but with a playful twist. And I bet you can probably guess what the playful twist is. Cricketers, net boarders and cyclists across the Vale of Belvoir in the East Midlands all feature in this calendar girls style. Belvoir unveiled nude calendar for 2025. Organiser Michelle Oldfield from Crockwell Bishop, which itself is a fantastic place name. Love that. In Nottinghamshire, said she wanted to raise awareness after being treated for breast cancer and she rallied her community to take part in a photo shoot for the cheeky 2025 calendar. The months feature more than 30 people and capture the stunning beauty of the veil of Belvoir and the stunning beauty of other aspects as well, I imagine. and has so far raised 2000 pounds for breast cancer now and prostate Cancer UK. So well done Michelle. I think that's a great job. Yeah, amazing. keep an eye out for that calendar. What about you Piers, who's your superstar?

Piers Townley: I just think if my fundraising team suggests such a thing like that, I will definitely be politely declining that one. What month would you choose, mister September also. Never going to happen. No, never going to happen.

Snow dog sculptures to raise money for Derbyshire hospice

I'm not sure why I've gravitated to animal news and stories, this podcast, but one caught my eye isn't a person as such, but a collection, and it's a collection of dogs. And I love the impact the snowman stories have around this time of year, around Christmas time of year, and the impact those stories had when my kids were growing up around Christmas. And inspired by them are the snow dog sculptures, which is fundraising for the Blythe house hospice. The Blythe house hospice mouthful there in Derbyshire.

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And it's going to feature twelve large snow dog sculptures from artists across the UK, and they're going to be on display around the town of Buxton and they're going to be auctioned off in December. Each one's going to have a reserved price of 1500 pounds, but some of the designs and some of the art on them are just absolutely beautiful and obviously based on that lovely, lovely story around that time of year. And Sophie Wheeldon, the senior community fundraiser of Blythe House Hospice, said, I think they are absolutely incredible. They're so unique and it's a once in a lifetime opportunity for us as a hospice and for Buxton as a town to get something like this. It is beautiful to see them here in all their glory, and they look brilliant, Tim. And they're inspired from such a christmasy, wonderful story and to support the simply incredible work the hospice do in the area. And indeed, you know, a big shout out to all the hospices around the UK and all they do for so many people. I think in both roles that we have at the charities, we see so much great work being done by hospices and sometimes they are overlooked. but they are an incredible function, but everyone should get behind.

Tim Beynon: I think there's a brilliant fundraiser. I've seen them before. I know in Bristol they had, Wallace and gromit statues, around the city for a while and they were all auctioned off, raised a huge amount of money for Charity because they not only, you know, give an artist an opportunity to show their skill, they also brighten up the local community. They give people something to visit, to look at and to try and find around the whole of Bristol. Maybe there was a hunt you could go on around Bristol to find all the Wallace and grommets, and at the end of the day, they're auctioned off and they raise a huge amount of money for Charity. So, yeah, more of that I think.

Piers Townley: We know all about, isn't it? wouldn't.

Tim Beynon: Yeah, absolutely.

Coming up

Piers Townley: So that's it for episode twelve. Huge thanks to a dealer for really giving us something to consider professionally and personally in terms of whether stay on X War turn to something new. And we've got some other great guests coming up on the next few episodes, too.

Tim Beynon: Absolutely. We certainly have, huh? Coming up next time, we're going to be talking about challenge events with Tracy Ann Breeze and finding out why charities need to be doing more of them. And in November, we'll also be discussing philanthropy and major donors. And we'll be welcoming a very special celebrity guest onto the show to talk about his penchant for extreme challenges. So find out who he is in a few episodes of time.

Piers Townley: Sounds, intriguing. And don't forget, you can be part of the show, too. Just send us your voice messages. We'll get in touch through any of the links in the show notes to share your stories and tell us what you'd like us to cover.

Tim Beynon: Don't forget, we want to know who your superstar fundraisers, volunteers, or colleagues are, too. So head to the show notes and share their brilliance with the rest of us.

Piers Townley: And in the meantime, please follow or subscribe to us on your usual podcast platform and leave us a review, both of which will help others to find the show.

Tim Beynon: So that's it for this episode. Thank you for listening. Take care and we'll see you soon.

Adeela Warley: It.

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