Strategies for identifying stories that exemplify your organization’s mission

Target audience: Nonprofits, NGOs, cause organizations, social enterprises, brands, educators, video producers, Web publishers, storytellers, individuals.

Part 1 of a two-part series focused on using video to tell compelling stories. Also see part 2:
• 16 tips for making video interviews come alive

By Lindsay Oberst
Socialbrite staff

All too often, nonprofit organizations fail to take advantage of their greatest asset: stories.

Stories help us interact with our world and make sense of it. They link us together and shape our view of the world. Nonprofits, however, often miss the stories that surround them; the stories that can help them raise more funding, expand awareness of their cause and reach their goals.

Rob Wu is the creator of CauseVox, a platform to help nonprofits raise funds. He believes that nonprofits are missing a huge opportunity in stories.

“Generally, nonprofits use some level of storytelling but not to the fullest,” Wu said in an email. “The nonprofits that use stories in a meaningful way craft an overarching narrative of their organization and supporting stories that compel their audiences to action. Often, I hear nonprofits talk about fundraising strategies or a communications plan, but seldom do they talk about a storytelling strategy.”

Using stories is something that nonprofits can do in many areas of their work, yet videos are a particularly powerful tool. Especially considering that U.S. Internet viewers watch almost 20 hours of online video per month, according to statistics released in June.

Video storytelling draws us in by appealing to our emotions — a faraway woman with big eyes telling us about the children she can barely feed or the excitable entrepreneur full of passion for his idea. And then if done properly, video stories cause people to take action.

If your nonprofit wants to make use of stories, how can you take a step back and find the right stories that support the causes that matter to you? Here are three steps you can take to discover amazing, powerful stories to use in your own videos:

Be open to telling stories

Storytellers for Good

1When stories are part of daily work, people work in a different way. They start asking questions and listening to people more deeply.

Cara Jones founded Storytellers for Good as a platform for telling and promoting stories of people who are making a positive difference. She believes nonprofits should create a storytelling culture in the work place.

“This will have an inspirational impact on all involved,” Jones said by email.

If you want to find stories, you’ve got to weave them into your business model, always seeking them out with a method to collect them.

On the Causevox blog, Jones gives the following tips, which can help nonprofits pay attention to stories:

• Hold a monthly event where you gather your employees to share inspiring stories.
• Create an organizational story bank to record these stories.

Danielle Bernstein created Clear Films, an independent production company dedicated to social change. She also encourages the nonprofits she works with to think about the stories that surround their missions.

She carries a camera with her most of the time. With the rise of easy, handy video cameras, it’s possible for all nonprofits to equip someone on their team with a video camera.

Another thing you can do is to stimulate your creativity by watching other great videos. (Here are eight great examples of nonprofit video storytelling.)

When your nonprofit opens itself to stories, it welcomes great work even with limited resources. But you have to find the right stories that people can relate to.

Look for a story people can identify with

2As you begin to see stories around you, you’ll notice how our stories all contain common threads. Keep yourself aware of the stories that appeal to your personal emotions in some way. These stories are often can be used by nonprofits to make a difference.

“The stories that rise to the top for video purposes will be emotionally compelling,” Jones said.

“Without emotion, without that feeling, people just don’t get inspired,” Chris Yates said in a phone interview. He created Huddle Productions, which combines social media and video.

Sparking inspiration with your videos is important. However, the best videos — the ones that inspire people to act — go further and create a feeling of hope. Tragedy and transformation are key components that work well in nonprofit videos. Both of these can inspire hope when the story has a positive aspect to it.

Bernstein talked about the importance of uplifting stories. If people are going to take action after watching a video story, they need to believe that change is possible.

Pinpointing individuals is also critical. “It’s about trusting when you connect with people,” Bernstein said. “There’s always something even with different cultures.”

The charity:water campaign for clean water in Haiti.

charity: water is a wonderful example of a nonprofit using specific stories to support their efforts to bring clean water to people in developing nations. They have a section on their blog devoted to individual stories “from the field” and “from the office.” Also, they highlight stories in their videos. For example, their water campaign for Haiti uses the story of one of their workers to frame the need for help in Haiti.

As Yates said, “You’ve got to make it personal. Nobody really feels sympathy for a brand.”

Be patient and the stories will surface

3The best stories aren’t always the ones that jump out at you. Sometimes the real stories are the ones you only notice after interacting with people several times.

“It’s about taking the time to be where you need to be,” Bernstein said. “And then spending the time you need to spend.”

Yates doesn’t believe in forcing the story. He doesn’t go into an interview with specific questions. Instead, he allows the story to surface from the conversation.

“The best stories are the answers,” he said. “It’s not my story, it’s their story.”

Humans have always communicated using stories. Some stories are hundreds of years old and are still used to teach and inform people today.

How is your nonprofit organization incorporating stories into its strategy? Have you used stories in your video campaigns? Tell us in the comments below!

Coming in Part 2: Tips for getting people to tell stories on camera

PHOTO AT TOP BY Rae Allen

Related

• Use video to get to heart of your organization’s story: An interview with Cara Jones (Socialbrite)

• 8 great examples of nonprofit storytelling (Socialbrite)

• How nonprofits should be using visual storytelling (Socialbrite)

• Articles on how nonprofits can create media (Socialbrite)

The post How to find amazing, powerful stories for your nonprofit video appeared first on Socialbrite.

Target audience: Nonprofits, social enterprises, NGOs, foundations, cause organizations, Web publishers, small businesses.

As regular readers know, I’ve been a longtime proponent of visual storytelling to advance the missions of nonprofits, cause organizations and businesses. (Heck, I co-founded Ourmedia.org before there was a YouTube.) People take action on behalf of a cause only when they feel an emotional connection, and yet nonprofits in particular are famously bad at telling their own stories.

What we tell people in our Socialbrite bootcamps and in our consulting work is this: Every nonprofit is now a media organization (the same goes for social enterprises and businesses). Never before have the tools of visual storytelling been so inexpensive, easy to use and accessible to the masses.

So why aren’t you taking advantage of visual storytelling yet? (Or are you? Tell us in the comments!)

There are dozens of ways to convey your story, and we’ve laid out lots of ways to get started — see the links at the bottom of this article.

Today we’d like to highlight a few best-of-breed examples of visual storytelling so that you can think about how to take a similar approach for your organization. At least one of the examples cited below should trigger an insight — an idea that resonates or an approach that you might consider using with your team or with a production partner.

Remember, it’s not about the tools or the technology. It’s about finding people who encapsulate what your core objective is all about — and conveying their stories with power, genuineness, passion and humility. Some can be elaborate productions, with narration, titling and musical score all working together. Others can be as simple as holding up a video-capable smartphone to capture a moment.

One you have a visual story, or several, that you can draw upon, you’ll be able to begin using it in your public outreach: on your website or blog, on your Facebook page, in your annual report, in your email newsletters. And don’t forget to enter contests like the DoGooder Awards, TechSoup Storytelling Challenge or CurrentTV’s just-ended The Current Cause, where $15,000 in prizes will be awarded.

Here are seven great examples of nonprofit storytelling:

1/ Classic video advocacy

“Breathe,” by Repower America

advocacyLast month’s 5th annual DoGooder Nonprofit Video Awards, presented by YouTube and See3 Communications — See3 is at the forefront of nonprofit video storytelling — drew 1,350 submissions from 750 nonprofits, with 16 finalists and four winners.

Among the winners were:
• Best thrifty video: It’s In Your Hands, by Watershed Management Group
• Best large organization video: A Public Service Announcement Not Approved by AJWS, by the American Jewish World Service

Some entries I liked better included:
• Breathe, by Repower America (1:33, embedded above)
• The funny, celebrity-studded Seriously, Serious PSA (featuring B.J. Novak & Friends) by malarianomore (1:01)

Sign up to receive See3’s Daily DoGooder: a daily cause video delivered to your in-box.

And here were the 2010 winners. Observe how other organizations are telling their stories — which style did you like: earnest, funny, polished, grassroots?

2/ Digital stories using photos & narration

“Mountaintop Library Expands Horizons,” by Room to Read

digital storiesI’ve been involved in the digital storytelling movement since 2004. A vastly underutilized medium, digital storytelling uses photos, video, film or found materials, combined with voice-over narration, to convey powerful, evocative stories with a rich emotional dimension.

Our in-depth tutorials Digital storytelling from soup to nuts and Digital storytelling: A tutorial in 10 easy steps offers some great examples. But for a simpler way to do this, look no further than the winner of February’s TechSoup Storytelling Challenge.

The first place winner, Mountaintop Library Expands Horizons, by Room to Read (embedded above), took advantage of visually stunning photos taken in Nepal and weaved together a simple 60-second story about the San Francisco nonprofit’s global literacy mission. Nicely done — with no video at all. This is something your organization can do on its own, no?

3/ Videos with a call to action

call to actionSince YouTube rolled out a free “call-to-action overlay” feature for nonprofits in March 2009, a lot of nonprofits (but too few) have made use of the technique. Nonprofits can place an “ask” in the opaque pop-up overlay. As YouTube explains:

“Adding a Call-to-Action overlay to your video is easy. First, run a campaign to promote your video on YouTube. Then, go to the Video Details page under My Videos and fill out the fields in the section marked ‘Call-to-Action overlay.’ All you have to do is include a short headline, ad text, a destination url, and upload an optional image, and the overlay will appear whenever someone watches your video. Clicks on the overlay will be tracked in YouTube Insight.”

YouTube also offers tips on how to run an effective campaign.

Two examples:

• World Water Day Video from charity: water, with a 15-second ad overlay at the beginning, earned charity: water $10,000 in a single day, largely thanks to YouTube placing it on its home page. The overlay url takes users to its Donate page.

• StillerStrong, stealing great ideas from other charities to build schools in Haiti, with an ad overlay throughout. I think we’ll increasingly see requests for text2give mobile donations, as shown above.

4/ Mobile devices: Video on the go

mobileSometimes, simple is better. Video producers and photographers often say, the best device is the one you have with you — and that gadget is increasingly a smartphone — an iPhone, Android device or Nokia phone — or a Flip cam or other portable device.

Here are two examples:

• Flip Video and Save the Bay

• Save Our Sounds, by J.D. Lasica, interview conducted in London with a Flip HD Ultra.

5/ Animation

“Do You Own Stuff Made by Slaves?” by Call + Response

animationSome subjects are best told using evocative imagery or animation rather than documentary or traditional video techniques.

Six examples:

• The Girl Effect, by girleffect, is almost without peer.

• Do You Own Stuff Made by Slaves, by Call + Response (2:01) doesn’t have celebrities, but it contains a compelling, little-heard message and inventive animation.

• The EACH Campaign, by LegatumMedia, is visually arresting, though may lack a sufficient emotional impact.

• Prospera: A new way of doing business in Mexico: a social enterprise story.

• 300 Years of Fossil Fuels in 300 Seconds, by the Post Carbon Institute, won the Best large organization video in the Do Gooder Nonprofit Video Awards.

• Closed Zone, by Ground Report: life in Gaza.

6/ Creative mashups

mashupsOne of my favorite flavors of nonprofit storytelling is the kind that takes advantage of the visually interesting styles you can get by using sites like RockYou, Slide, Animoto and Stupeflix. (We covered them in Mash up a visual story for your nonprofit.) The creative possibilities are boundless.

One example is the Will Steger Foundation Mashup Video, showing climate change made accessible.

7/ Personalized videos

personalized videosThis is a risky technique — the line between engaging and gimmicky is a thin one — but I’m still a fan of videos that let viewers insert themselves into the storyline. For young people in particular, personalization is part of the new media ecosystem.

Note: These videos have been removed.

• beyond oil, by Moving Beyond Oil, lets you “make this video about you” by adding your name and email address and forwarding it to President Obama.

• Glenn Beck Attacks Progressive Voter, by cnnbc (aka MoveOn.org), is a funny takedown of the wacked-out Fox News show host — using clips of his own rants — who was recently fired by the network. One lesson: Someones humor works in a field where we take our work very seriously.

8/ High-end professional productions

Trailer of Burbax, Ethiopia from A Glimmer of Hope on Vimeo.

high-endI saved the high-end professional productions for last because most nonprofits look at these, throw up their hands and say, I can’t do that. Well, two answers. First, maybe you can, by partnering with an organization like Storytellers for Good, a small outfit in San Francisco that’s doing some amazing work with nonprofits (see video at top). Second, don’t get distracted by productions whose budgets outstrip your budget — people don’t expect every visual story to be a masterpiece.

If you hook up with the right storytelling organization — ActiveVoice in San Francisco and Free Range Studios in New York are also good places to start — or if you have a decent budget, then find a local video production outfit and go for it.

Here are seven high-end professionally produced videos that caught my eye:

• LTBH Feature – Austin 2009, by A Glimmer of Hope, at the top of this story. A Glimmer of Hope also offers some wonderful examples of storytelling with images.
• Trailer of Burbax, Ethiopia, by A Glimmer of Hope — the music chokes me up every time I watch it.
• Mama Hope, by Storytellers for Good (above)
• Charity: water’s September birthdays — or almost any charity: water video
• Jai Pausch Public Service Announcement by the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network at pancan.org
• Rooftop Gardens, on CurrentTV — while I love CurrentTV, they could benefit from a big splash of variety.
• And, of course, let’s not forget the Official music video for OK Go’s “White Knuckles,” benefiting the ASPCA — 9.7 million YouTubers can’t be wrong.

I’m sure you have your own favorites — please share. Which kind of storytelling do you like, and why? What did I miss? Let us know in the comments!

Related

• How nonprofits should be using visual storytelling (Socialbrite)

• Visual storytelling checklist (Socialbrite)

• Mash up a visual story for your nonprofit (Socialbrite)

• Digital storytelling: A tutorial in 10 easy steps (Socialbrite)

• Roundup of resources on how to create media (Socialbrite)

• Create video stories for your nonprofit in 6 steps (Socialbrite)

• How to maximize your nonprofit’s impact with YouTube (Socialbrite)

• Vimeo channels for nonprofits

• How to run an effective campaign (YouTube)

• Secrets to Nonprofit Video Success (CitizenTube)

• Kivi Miller’s Delicious bookmarks on nonprofit storytelling

The post 8 great examples of nonprofit storytelling appeared first on Socialbrite.