At Inweb, we believe that simple and honest accounts of day-to-day work, successes and challenges, even stories of mistakes, can be an invaluable resource for anyone working in the charity sector.Today we are pleased to present to you a conversation with Dmytro Romashko, head of the digital department of the “Voices of Children” charitable foundation. Dmytro shared his experience of working in a charity foundation, talked about the peculiarities of communication with different audiences and revealed the secrets of effective SMM in the charity sector.
Start of work in the fund
Children’s Voices Charitable Foundation is a Ukrainian non-profit organization that has been providing psychological and psychosocial support to children affected by the war in Ukraine since 2015.Strengthening of communities and children’s institutions (repair and arrangement of children’s spaces, hubs, shelters).Professional support of specialists and expertise in war trauma.
Dmytro Romashko joined the “Voices of Children” foundation on June 21 last year. Before that, his professional path was quite varied. He worked in commercial projects: at AliExpress, as a TV presenter at Music Box, and spent a year volunteering and collecting.
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“The first months at SMM in the non-commercial sphere were quite difficult for me, because I myself am a lawyer by education, I once worked in the Kharkiv regional administration, which was bombed, so I wrote in rather boring clerical terms. You know, this is “in accordance with”, “according to” – it had to be changed in the fund, because such communication is difficult to perceive.”
Communication channels and target audience
Children’s Voices Foundation uses various communication channels for different audiences:Facebook in Ukrainian (37 thousand subscribers). Target audience: parents with children, Ukrainian donors, partners, journalists. Content: information about the fund’s activities, tips, news, reports.”Our Ukrainian-language page is designed for communication with parents who have children. Our main goal is to remove stigmatization in applications to psychologists and coverage of the work. There are also journalists, Ukrainian-speaking donors and partners who follow. Over the past year, 20,000 subscribers have been added, mainly due to psychoeducational materials (advice) from our psychologists.”Facebook in English , aimed at an international audience.Here we show the work of the foundation. The assistance provided thanks to the support of donors and partners. We also provide information about war news related to children. But ethically, without sensitive photos.”Instagram in English (13 thousand readers).
“With the start of a full-scale war, Madonna, Oprah, many celebrities supported us. Subscribers have arrived. Now it is more difficult, because emotional and hyped content is always better. But we do not sacrifice children, we do not display unacceptable or sensitive photos.
Measuring the effectiveness of communication channels
Dmytro talks about their approach to analyzing the effectiveness. Of various communication channels. We monitor how the channels work based on the statistics of calls to our psychological support line 0800 210 106 . That is, every month we analyze where people find out about us. How many people came after seeing us on Facebook, Viber, and so on. Colleagues also provide us with help from the CRM system. After that, at a joint communication meeting, we analyze what worked and what didn’t. Which topics “went in” the best, and which posts “failed”. For example, we already know that our target audience likes psychoeducation the most. These are cool, bright pictures with illustrations on a psychological topic, where complex topics are clearly explained or advice is given. They are prepared by our psychologists and a communicator. Also, each direction of our communication department has its own KRIs, which come from the communication strategy.
Communication team structure and work processes
The communications sms mailing for library team of the “Voices of Children” foundation consists of. Head of the fund’s communication department.The Digital and SMM department (that’s us) is SMM managers and a literary editor who also handles news for the site.Creative team (designers who do everything from the design of our centers and bigboards for social campaigns, to visuals in SMM).
Production team (producer and cameraman).Media direction. Managers of work with mass media and coordination with regional centers of the fund. A professional psychologist who checks our content from a psychological point of view.We select the content according to the rubric. That is, I will not post several similar news in a row. I choose different content so that it alternates. Psychoeducation, reporting posts, or founders’ column. And we try to balance it all so that it’s really interesting.”The team simultaneously creates content for Ukrainian-speaking and foreign audiences. It is important that the management of the fund assumes that everyone can make mistakes, and not only those who do nothing. That is, each member of the team can safely try and offer ideas.
Content creation and distribution
The foundation team has a sad life box communication and SMM strategy. Developed based on the experience, ethics and policy of communication with children. This is important, because the foundation. Working with children who have experience of war, talks about many sensitive topics, and it is impossible to do without a careful and balanced attitude to the content.“We have a written ToV [brand voice — ed. ed.]. For us, children are not “little Ukrainians whom we save and assert ourselves”, they are individuals who found themselves in conditions that no one chose. And this is not our future, but the present of Ukraine. We have a communication and SMM strategy, a brand book. During meetings, we collect all tips, achievements, important points, conclusions from which we learn in a document called “Important links”. And when a new person comes, we show this document, explain and move on together in sync.”
The process of creating content at the “Voices of Children. Foundation is based on the foundation’s news, event announcements. Useful posts from psychologists, children’s. Quotes about the war, posts by the foundation’s ambassadors, and reports. Dmitry explains:”Sometimes we feel like we’re working on live news. We have a plan, we more or less know what we have next week. But at the same time, a lot of things are happening at the same time.