Creating campaign content that connects

Once you know what your campaign is trying to achieve and who you’re trying to reach, the next step is bringing your message to life. 

For many small charities, creating campaign content can feel overwhelming. You might already be balancing social media, newsletters, fundraising, service promotion and everything else your organisation delivers. 

The good news is that effective campaign content doesn’t need to be complicated. 

Great content starts with understanding your audience, knowing what action you want them to take and finding simple ways to tell your story. 

Whether you’re creating content to raise awareness, recruit volunteers, increase donations or promote a service, this guide (part of Media Trust’s Campaign Creator 5-day email series) will help you create content that connects. 

Start with your audience

Before creating any content, it’s important to come back to the audience you identified earlier in the week. 

A common mistake is starting with what you want to say, rather than thinking about what your audience needs to hear. Your content will be much more effective if it connects with their experiences, interests and motivations. 

Think about what information your audience needs to understand, what emotion or connection you want to create and what action you want them to take. 

What does your audience need to know?

Let’s return to Community Connect, our fictional charity tackling loneliness among older people. 

In part two of our Campaign Creator series, they developed a campaign story centred on loneliness among older people, alongside key messages about the impact of connection and the role volunteers can play. Now it’s time to turn those messages into content. 

Rather than repeatedly posting ‘we need volunteers’, they can create a range of content that helps people understand the issue, see the difference they could make and take action. 

This might include volunteer stories, myth-busting content about loneliness and behind-the-scenes insights into their befriending service. 

By starting with their campaign story, every piece of content reinforces the same message and campaign goal. 

Turn your ideas into content

Often, some of your strongest content ideas are already happening within your organisation. 

Think about the people you support, your volunteers, your team and the moments that show the impact of your work. 

You could create content around ideas like: 

• A day in the life of… Showing what volunteering, working at your charity or using your service actually looks like.
• What your support actually does helping people understand the difference their donation, time or support creates.
• Myth vs fact challenging common misunderstandings about your cause.
• Meet the team introducing the people behind your organisation. 
• Behind the scenes showing the work that happens before a service, event or activity takes place.
• A beginner’s guide… Making your expertise easier for new audiences to understand. 

The best content ideas are often the ones that help people see your work from a new perspective.

Create a simple campaign content plan

Once you have your campaign ideas, and an idea of the content you’ll create, the next step is deciding when you’ll share it and what role each piece of content will play. 

A content plan doesn’t need to be complicated. A simple spreadsheet or table can help you organise your ideas, stay consistent and make sure every piece of content supports your campaign goal. 

When planning content, think about what each piece is trying to achieve. Different content serves different purposes throughout a campaign. For example, you might want to: 

• Build awareness of an issue or need
• Introduce your campaign
• Share stories and experiences
• Encourage people to take action
• Create urgency as your campaign comes to an end
• Show the impact of support 

Using a mix of these content types can help keep your campaign engaging and guide people from awareness to action. 

Example content plan

Community Connect wants to recruit 15 volunteer befrienders. Their content plan might look like this: 

You can then adapt this approach for any campaign goal. For example: 

• A fundraising campaign could share what donations make possible.
• A volunteer campaign could introduce your team and volunteers.
• An awareness campaign could share stories, facts and ways people can learn more.  

Make your content work smarter

Creating a campaign doesn’t mean creating completely different content for every platform. One story or idea can often be adapted in different ways depending on where your audience sees it. 

For example, Community Connect could take a volunteer story and turn it into a social media post, a newsletter feature, a website story or a short video. The message stays the same, but the format changes. 

This approach can save time and make content creation feel much more manageable, especially if you’re working with a small team and limited resources. Instead of creating something new for every channel, think about how you can reuse and adapt the content you already have. 

Before creating your content plan, consider: 

• What stories, images or resources do you already have?
• Which channels are most important for reaching your audience?
• Where is your audience most likely to engage?
• Who will help create and approve content?

You don’t need to be everywhere. Focusing your efforts on a few key channels and making the most of the content you already have is often far more effective than trying to do everything at once. 

Make your content accessible and inclusive

Creating content that more people can engage with starts with small changes. 

Before sharing your campaign content, check whether your message is clear, whether you’ve avoided unnecessary jargon and whether people can access it in different ways. 

Simple steps like adding captions to videos, using clear language, including image descriptions and thinking carefully about whose voices are represented can help more people connect with your campaign. 

If you’re creating graphics, check that text is easy to read, colours have enough contrast and important information isn’t only communicated through images. 

For more information, RNIB have a great free guide to making your social media accessible. 

Your campaign’s next steps

By now, you should have a clearer idea of what your audience needs to know, feel and do, as well as some content ideas that bring your campaign message to life. 

Remember, your content doesn’t need to be perfect. It needs to communicate why your cause matters and give people a clear reason to get involved. 

Start with one strong message, tell a meaningful story and build from there. 

When you’re ready, move on to part four: Launching and promoting your campaign. 

The Campaign Creator email series

Want to receive our 5-day email series on campaign creation? You’ll get an email from us each day for 5 days, including expert tips, links and your free campaign creator workbook!

You’ll receive a practical email and accompanying resource each day, guiding you through every stage of planning, creating, launching and evaluating a charity campaign.