by Jayne Cravens

How Volunteers Can Help in Communications, Outreach & Marketing for Nonprofits & NGOs

All employees at a nonprofit should be looking for ways volunteers can be involved in their work. Same for lead volunteers - those who have an ongoing role with your program. Involving volunteers in your organization's activities shows the community that you want them to be involved with your organization on a deeper level than just making financial donations and it shows you value community investment. It can also connect you with services and resources you could not access otherwise. It helps promote your organization as one that is transparent and welcoming. Yes, it can also mean that a task can take longer than if you just did it yourself, and volunteer involvement does NOT always save money - in fact, in terms of staff oversight, it can be expensive for an organization to involve volunteers. But the benefits far, far outweigh the negatives.

There are a variety of ways of volunteers can help nonprofits in their communications, outreach and marketing activities. Here are some ideas (and I've involved volunteers in MOST of these activities myself when working at nonprofits):

Take photos at events and meetings, to use in your social media, your web site, print publications, grant programs, etc. They can use their own camara phones and either download them to a flash drive or upload them to a shared online space, like Google Photos, for you to use.
Take video footage at events and meetings, for you or an expert volunteer to edit into a video you need for communications.
Design simple flyers, event posters, etc., adhering to good design priciples.
Make or update a list of contact information for a specific audience you are trying to reach: all the communities of faith (churches, temples, mosques) in one zip code, all of the social groups in your area (Rotary, Kiwanis, Optimist, etc.), all of the computer science faculty at a nearby college or university, all of the nonprofits focused on clean water issues in a state, etc.
Ensure your organization's Facebook page is following other pages it should be, like local government offices, local communities of faith, local youth groups, national nonprofits focused on specific topics, etc.
Help to staff an information table or booth at an event (but remember that they must be trained for to appropriately represent your nonprofit).
Research a topic you need to write about, or double check all of the resources you've gathered using an AI tool, to confirm they are accurate and not hallucinated.
Caption your YouTube videos, or correct the automated captions generated by YouTube.
Translate text from English to another language, or editing the translation work of others, or editing a translation you created using an online tool, to assure it's accurate and appropriate. Remember that they could transate the English language captions on your YouTube videos!
Help to prepare a mass mailing (folding brochures or cards, putting items in envelopes, putting address labels on envelopes, etc.).
Take drone footage of a work or event site (providing they have a drone and know how to use it, and providing that you have a need for such footage).
Go through your web site and create alt text for EVERY photo and graphic, thereby making your web site more accessible for sight-impaired people who use screen reading tech.
Go through your web site and either change every "click here" or "read more" similar link to a descriptive link, or to make a list of every page with this problem so that your web manager can address it later. Again, this makes your web site more accessible for sight-impaired people who use screen reading tech.
Go through your web site and make sure every page has a title in the HTML for title. This both improves Search Engine Optimization (SEO) and also makes your web site more accessible for sight-impaired people who use screen reading tech.
Design web pages or develop an entire web site.
Edit or or draft the first versions of proposals, press releases, newsletter articles, video scripts, web pages, etc.
Tag photos and files with keywords (so that they can be more easily found by internal staff, search engines, the press, etc.).
Managing your social media: scheduling posts, replying to and liking comments, liking other organization's posts, etc. HOWEVER, this is a role that should be turned over to a volunteer only if that volunteer has been well trained and has a proven track record of producing appropriate material. Also, the marketing manager still needs to read social media at least once a week, to know what's happening first hand, to see trends first hand, etc.
Drive to libraries in your area and anywhere there is a bulletin board for event flyers (many grocery stores have such in the hallway leading to the bathrooms) and put your small poster or flyer up.

Have more ideas? Share them here.

Remember that, before you recruit for any of these roles, you need to have the expectations of the role IN WRITING. Here's advice on how to write a volunteer role description that will screen out people who wouldn't be appropriate, will screen in the best candidates, and will better ensure success (because expectations will be CLEAR).

Also, in the case of communications activities that will be in print or online, you will want to review ALL materials produced by a volunteer before they become public, at least until the volunteer has proven to be reliable, accurate, always adhering to the company's brand and outreach guidelines, etc.

Also see:

Examples of online volunteering roles and activities (virtual volunteering).
The most comprehensive list anywhere.
How Volunteers Can Help With Fundraising Activities.
Also the most comprehensive list anywhere.
How Volunteers Can Support the Person In Charge of Volunteer Engagement
The person in charge of volunteer engagement at a nonprofit, NGO, charity, school or other civil society organization or mission-based program primarily recruits and manages volunteers that are supporting other staff: the program staff, for instance, may need mentors for clients or people to clean up a public space or to foster animals. The fundraising staff may need volunteers to staff a donor event. But the person in charge of volunteer engagement should also be thinking about how volunteers can help with volunteer engagement - with recruitment, onboarding, training, support and recognition of volunteers. This resource provides information on how and why to do that
Short-term Assignments for Tech Volunteers
There are a variety of ways for mission-based organizations to involve volunteers to help with short-term projects relating to computers and the Internet, and short-term assignments are what are sought after most by potential "tech" volunteers. But there is a disconnect: most organizations have trouble identifying such short-term projects. This is a list of short-term projects for "tech" volunteers -- assignments that might takes days, weeks or just a couple of months to complete.
One(-ish) Day "Tech" Activities for Volunteers
Volunteers are getting together for intense, one-day events, or events of just a few days, to build web pages, to write code, to edit Wikipedia pages, and more. These are gatherings of onsite volunteers, where everyone is in one location, together, to do an online-related project in one day, or a few days. It's a form of episodic volunteering, because volunteers don't have to make an ongoing commitment - they can come to the event, contribute their services, and then leave and never volunteer again. Because computers are involved, these events are sometimes called hackathons, even if coding isn't involved. This page provides advice on how to put together a one-day event, or just-a-few-days-of activity, for a group of tech volunteers onsite, working together, for a nonprofit, non-governmental organization (NGO), community-focused government program, school or other mission-based organization - or association of such.
Creating One-Time, Short-Term Group Volunteering Activities
Details on not just what groups of volunteers can do in a two-hour, half-day or all-day event, but also just how much an organization or program will need to do to prepare a site for group volunteering. It's an expensive, time-consuming endeavor - are you ready? Is it worth it?
Make All Volunteering as Accessible as Possible: advantages for your program & how to do it

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