With more than 180,000 charities in England and Wales, those that don’t run a planned PR programme will struggle to raise awareness or funds.

The majority of charities in Britain are small and lack the resources to bring in specialist communications support. While investment is needed, effective public relations can still be delivered on a small budget. Indeed, smaller charities can play to their strengths.

If you have a smaller hierarchy than the bigger charities then use that advantage to make quicker decisions. If you’re quick, you can piggyback on breaking news. Have numbers, email addresses and Twitter handles for relevant journalists ready and contact them if you can add a unique angle to a news story.

Plan: more with less

Buy a year wall planner and map out your key campaigns. Pay particular attention to holidays, awareness weeks and special events. Use websites to find out what’s coming up in the year ahead. For example, many magazines start planning Christmas editions in the summer months.

Choose a small number of topics to campaign on, spread across the year. It’s always better to do a few things well, rather than many things badly.

What do you have to offer?

Two great assets will be the life stories of your beneficiaries and your staff: they are probably experts. Think of the human angle.

How will you reach your audience?

You have a several choices here:

• Digital and social media – social media isn’t free. To use platforms properly you need to invest the time and effort to engage people – not just broadcast at them. Don’t forget LinkedIn – it’s popular with professionals who may be able to support your charity. YouTube is the world’s second-largest search engine: shoot a video and make it easy to find by naming and tagging it.

• Your supporters and corporate partners – your supporters are not just cash cows; they can help you get your message out. Never be afraid to get someone else to do the job for you. Half of public relations is about getting other people to repeat your messages.

Publications want letters to the editor with strong but informed opinions. The letters pages are among the most read in many publications.

Pick up your phone

You can do more than just call journalists using your phone. The media prefer visual packages along with your quote or interview. That could mean a video for their websites, photographs and audio. If you’re on a tight budget you can produce them all on a smartphone.

Get specialist help for free

Don’t forget that people and companies are often willing to give time and resources for free. Find some relevant agencies and ask them nicely for some pro bono support.

Become the go-to expert

Journalists want experts to bring further credibility to their stories. Be reliably available. Prepare biographies of your senior staff, photographs, video clips and background information on your charity. If you already have a policy position on a topical issue then get a quote prepared in advance.

Sign up to the CharityComms AskCharity service. which helps journalists find non-profits who can add something to their stories.

Further reading

Finally, if you want to read more about how to develop an effective PR strategy, I can highly recommend The PR Masterclass by Alex Singleton, published by Wiley and available through Guardian Books. It’s filled with ideas, tips and tricks to get your charity in the headlines at very little cost.

David Hamilton is head of public relations and engagement at Action for Children .

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