Charity buzz – Gorkana’s Annual Charity Barometer

Gorkana Group’s Annual Charity Barometer has just been published showing what an interesting year 2011 was! Sophie Hudson’s great piece in Third Sector highlights some key takeaways from the year.

With over 620,000 press, broadcast and online pieces of coverage analysed The Red Cross came out top with the highest volume of coverage for the entire year with a whopping 38,590 pieces.  Major world events helped to drive these volumes with news in March of the organisation withdrawing its workers from Benghazi, Libya over concerns of their safety due to the ongoing civil unrest.  Fundraising calls also drove coverage particularly in March and April following the massive earthquake and subsequent tsunami that hit Japans north-east coast on 11th March.

Other major world events drove coverage in the Humanitarian/Emergency sector, particularly the realisation of the scale of the crisis in East Africa.  Oxfam, Save the Children and the DEC all saw huge spikes in coverage following their actions to raise the profile of the issue and call for a big push from the international community.

Charity association with celebrities and public figures was strong again this year showing how important using well know figures is in raising a charity’s profile and fundraising ability.  In the year of the Royal Wedding any association with the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge was very powerful. They started the year by using their first official engagement to dedicate a new RNLI lifeboat at a ceremony in Anglesey. The royal wedding also proved to be a useful fundraising tool as Princess Beatrice auctioned the hat she wore to wedding on eBay, raising over £80,000 for UNICEF.

Both Comic Relief in March and BCC Children in Need in November created a lot of buzz.  Comic Relief’s fundraising total stands at over £108 million, with Chris Moyles and Comedy Dave’s world record breaking continuous broadcast contributing £2.6 million.  BBC Children in Need also had a record breaking year with over £26 million being raised on the night, the highest amount every raised in a single night. Set against the backdrop of tough economic times this highlights just how fantastic the British public are in times of need.

There was plenty more great work going on in the sector this year with leaders in their particular area having strong years too.  Top of their sector this year were:

• Humanitarian/Emergency – Red Cross
• Cancer – Cancer Research UK
• Other Health/Medical – British Heart Foundation
• Children – BBC Children in Need
• Animals – RSPCA
• Disability – Mencap
• Environment/Conservation – National Trust
• Other causes – Royal British Legion

So all in all another great year for the sector.  This is particularly good news given the tough times lots of charities are having securing funds and being able to continue providing the services and carrying out the research they have been doing.  Maintaining a strong public profile through the media can certainly help to keep them front of mind with the general public, their target audiences and ensuring they get their messages across in an ever competitive environment.

For 2012 we’ve included social media alongside the existing mainstream content, giving even more insight into the media landscape for the sector.  We’re already starting to see some interesting results showing how closely connected the two media areas are in driving forward the great work charities are doing, highlighting ongoing local and global issues and helping to drive fundraising.

To subscribe and/or download a sample of the monthly social and mainstream media Charity Barometer report click here.

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