In the early hours of Monday 6 February 2023, two major earthquakes hit northwest Syria and southeast Turkey causing devastation on a vast scale. Médecins Sans Frontières’ (MSF) teams, who were already working in northern Syria, immediately launched an emergency response and began treating patients and delivering supplies.

As it receives no funding from governments, it is imperative that MSF can maximise its fundraising from moments like this where the work it does is thrust into the national conversation. This was the driving force behind developing MI Media’s Emergency Response, a set of principles and actions for a paid media response that will maximise the potential fundraising returns from heightened interest in a charity’s work.

Whilst a humanitarian crisis is an obvious opportunity for charities like MSF to push for donations, there are opportunities for the principles of the Emergency Response to be repeated across the charity sector. From Nigel Farage criticising the work of RNLI, to a significant public figure revealing a cancer diagnosis, to the increasing use of foodbanks across the UK; it doesn’t take much for the work that charities of all types and sizes are involved with to be brough to the top of the news agenda.

With emergencies often out of the news cycle as quickly as they are in, reacting quickly with an effective media response is imperative to maximising the chances of a positive fundraising campaign. Below are the core principles we apply before, during and after an emergency hits.

At the point of and during the emergency

Determine the scale of the opportunity:

The key question we ask of any emergency is whether there is potential to jump on news coverage with paid support. Some stories that break don’t garner momentum and, for those, it may be futile to launch a paid campaign. Others, however, will break across a variety of news sources, will be discussed on social media and maybe even attract TV coverage. In such instances, a paid response should be taken very seriously indeed.

Tailor your creative:

Though having a creative template prepared before a response can save valuable time the moment an emergency hits, as soon as an emergency reveals itself, the creative must be tailored to the current context. We work with creative agencies to consider relevant imagery, facts & figures and different ways of storytelling. This is the moment to capture the public’s attention and secure their donations. It is paramount to underpin creative with a compelling call to action, highlighting the urgency of the situation and how your work plays a key role.

Make Donating Easy:

The crisis itself may engage with a broad audience of people who each have different preferences for how they like to donate. From press coupons and phone & text response to PayPal and website landing pages; we ensure that any charity we work with has a range of response mechanisms to prevent any donors from being excluded.

Keep on top of reporting:

Whilst an emergency may only garner news coverage for a couple of weeks, some do extend beyond that short period of time, Regardless, advertising remains effective even as news coverage tails off. We continue to track the sources of daily donations to determine whether public interest is still strong and that paid media should continue.