Step One: Recruiting Advocates for Roundtables
Roundtables are important to advocacy campaigns because they are the best opportunity to reach, persuade, and share concerns with a Member of Congress (MOC). Finding good champion advocates to share your message is the most important thing before hosting any roundtable and having the best advocates creates the best chances for success.
How can we find these champion advocates? A great place to start is to reach out to personal networks and pre-existing grassroots organizations.
Reaching out to Personal Networks to Find Champion Advocates
Everyone has a story, and oftentimes utilizing pre-existing relationships is the easiest way to find advocates for a variety of issues and allows you to learn more about the people in your network.
It’s important to share the campaign’s message and why this issue is important. Remember: the goal is to persuade the advocate that they are the best person to share this issue with MOCs. Personal networks aren’t the only place to find advocates, though, grassroots organizations are great places to look.
Utilizing Grassroots Organizations
There’s an organization or association for everything. Whatever issue a campaign is advocating for, there is likely a group that is advocating for something similar. Reach out, build the coalition, and expand the network from personal friends to hundreds of new people.
The great thing about grassroots organizations is everyone has their own personal network that can be utilized to find more champion advocates for the campaign’s cause. These champions likely know a lot about the issues if it fits within their organization. These advocates will be experts.
Wherever advocates are found, they will be key participants in roundtables and other tactics used to educate people, so it is important to ensure they align with the advocacy campaign’s message and can share effectively. Check out the second blog in my series to learn more about hosting a roundtable with the campaign’s champion advocates!
-Anika Rickard