More members for the patients' association
The question 
Our association is celebrating its thirtieth anniversary. An ideal opportunity to gain extra attention, via publicity, among other things. The most important objective: doubling our membership figures within two years.
The answer 
As an association, don’t concentrate exclusively on publicity in the national media, but also include the regional newspapers and RTV broadcasting channels in your publicity plan. Enable your contact person to build up a good relationship with the media at a regional and local level.
We have drawn up a media plan and in 2008 we will be training contact people in the development of media relations in a number of regions. We have developed a new web site to underpin both the national and regional media approach.
The result
Our efforts surrounding the anniversary celebrations attracted broad interest in a number of informative radio programmes. In the meantime, the training and coaching of our regional contacts has already commenced. An extensive forum function is being added to the web site that will enable this means of communication to develop into the Internet community for Parkinson patients and their environment.
