1. How has your organization used print and direct mail?
Our Mission: Sandhills Family Heritage Association strives to improve the quality of life for underserved communities in the Sandhills region of North Carolina through economic self-sufficiency, protection of land and livelihoods, preservation of African American cultural heritage and promotion of health and wellness.
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The success of our programs of H.O.P.E. – Heritage, Outreach, Preservation of Land and Economic Empowerment – relies on effective outreach and communication. SFHA works toward effective change in identified community challenges, increased knowledge of common history and empowerment of our neighbors by including their voices and their efforts to improve their families and communities. SFHA operates in several Sandhills, counties, Cumberland and Harnett.
Print materials help to spread information about our organization well beyond our Spring Lake base. Partners distribute print materials to inform community members of programs and upcoming events. SFHA print materials reach supporters, participants, volunteers and partners. We use program brochures, flyers, activity materials, handouts for special and community events, annual reports and our signature report to the community shared at our annual celebration.
SFHA has published a few soft-back books that tell the Sandhill’s story. We have used architectural renderings to produce materials highlighting our historic building renovation project. Program materials for instruction and guidance, such as with our workshops for creation of wills, help participants engage with the material and achieve their goals for the activity.
While SFHA used direct mail primarily for solicitation campaigns, we have added photos and graphics to recent mailing, including those for the historic building renovation.
SFHA has used self-serve printer shops and print orders at local businesses to produce print materials.
2. How does your nonprofit plan to use print and direct mail?
SFHA will continue to use print materials as detailed above. In addition, we will make changes to our direct mail fundraising campaigns by switching from letters to eye-catching mailers that combine graphics and print to tell our story and the story of African-Americans in the Sandhills.
SFHA will use mailers to reach potential partners throughout our communities and to recruit volunteers to work with our programs and events, such as Sankofa Youth, Health Wise, Food Distribution Activities, Spring Lake Farmers Market and the renovation of our restoration of an abandoned burial ground in our community, and renovation of our Historic Spring Lake Civic Center.
SFHA’s important work, outreach efforts and our focus on education, requires professional, attractive and effective print and direct mail materials. Telephathic’s grant will enable SFHA to work with talented graphic artists and document designers.
Our strategic plan includes increased focus on marketing and outreach efforts to reach more people over a broader area. This means more participants, volunteers, donors and community partners.
In the future, SFHA will use professional graphic artists, print businesses and will order based on each the need for the program or event. The ability to maintain a supply of print material or to store out print orders for print on demand helps with efforts to distribute and the need to revise.
3. How have print and direct mail helped to promote the valuable message and great things that your organization does?
As a community-based nonprofit organization, we are volunteer-driven and responsive to those with whom we partner and to those we serve. Our model for community engagement relies on our collaborative partnerships with other organizations, agencies and professionals. With a large mixture of people – youth, elders, varying income groups and education levels – SFHA reaches a broad group of community members with our print materials through direct mail, targeted placement of outreach materials and educational materials for our activities and programs. While we value our website as an effective communication tool, the diversity of our community requires communication on several fronts.
As Telepathic’s website notes, “print is not dead.” Many people prefer something informative and colorful in hand to take home, peruse at their leisure and have handy for future reference or pass on to others. We share information at community events held by other organizations, when invited to speak or present at an event and to advertise unique programs, such as the Sankofa Players historic reenactment group or our Annual Heritage Food Tasting event. Print materials help to get this information to many people across a wide geographic
SFHA has a multilayered, multi-generational story to tell about communities, the people and the NC Sandhills. Telepathic’s grant will help us to tell those stories, control our message, support those working on our behalf and ensure conformity of print materials throughout our service area.
