Building Deep and Wide Support for Land Conservation

The first conservation goal of the Land Trust Alliance’s new strategic plan is to “elevate land conservation as a priority nationwide.” To do this, we will “design and launch a coalition-based ‘Relevance Campaign,’ ” or, in other words, a marketing campaign with calls to action and a goal of public engagement in land conservation.

This is not a new idea. In fact, the Alliance’s strategic communications plan, which was adopted by the Alliance board of directors in 2013, calls for the Alliance to develop a campaign and raise funds. Moreover, the Land Trust Leadership Council has been enthusiastic about a marketing campaign since at least 2016. And other land trusts and organizations have been pursuing local and state campaigns: the Coalition of Oregon Land Trusts, Texas Agricultural Land Trust (accredited), Montana Association of Land Trusts, Openlands (accredited) in Chicago and the Conservation Trust for North Carolina (accredited) are only some of the organizations that are planning to or have launched campaigns.

Understanding the problem

All of these initiatives seek to solve the same problem, which is that most Americans have never heard of land trusts. Land and land conservation play little or no role in their lives, at least as far as they are concerned.

This past January, DHM Research conducted a national survey on behalf of the Alliance of 1,202 Americans to set a baseline for Americans’ understanding and impressions of land trusts. The survey split respondents into two groups, asking about land conservancies and land trusts separately. The results? While 86% of Americans have a favorable impression of land conservancies, only 58% feel the same about land trusts. And 29% don’t know what a land trust is.

The good news is that when the respondents were offered a definition of a land trust or land conservancy, they were 15 times more likely to offer a positive response. In other words, we need to get out there and tell our story if land trusts are to secure enough dollars, votes, volunteers and ambassadors to pursue their essential work.

Why the Land Trust Alliance?

As the national voice for land trusts, the Alliance is particularly well-positioned to launch a relevance campaign. With its partners, the Alliance

• can build a campaign that is focused on the issue of land conservation rather than any one brand.
• can speak with authority about land conservation and its myriad benefits.
• can tap into relationships and networks maintained by its land trust members across the country while also pursuing national partnerships.

Finally, and most important, land trusts are asking for this. Feedback from our members includes:

• “We would be glad to participate in a national campaign with a unifying message of land conservation. I think this is a great idea to increase knowledge of our mission and work!”
• “I love the idea of a national campaign connecting regional efforts to a bigger picture. I’d like to see as much diversity in the people represented in the campaign as there is diversity in the landscapes we protect.”
• “This is a great idea, and could be very beneficial to smaller land trusts like ours.”
• “We’re all in. We communicate nationally, regionally and locally and will be sure our colleagues throughout over 30 states are engaged in this ever-more-important Alliance-led campaign.”

What is a relevance campaign?

For those of us over a certain age, think back to watching TV in the ’70s and how you felt the first time you saw the “crying Indian” commercial, in which an actor portraying a Native American stands on the edge of a highway as a car drives by and throws trash at his feet. The camera then holds on his face as a single tear slides down. The campaign used the line “People Start Pollution. People can stop it.” The ad became one of the most memorable and successful campaigns in advertising history.

Today’s campaigns look very different. Regardless of your position on the issue, this year’s #NeverAgain campaign, which culminated in the March for Our Lives on March 24 in cities around the world, offers a terrific example of a modern campaign that includes many characteristics that we would do well to incorporate into our campaign:

• A concise, consistent and compelling goal: “Never Again”
• An actionable and focused call to action: “Vote.”
• A sense of urgency: “Act before the next school shooting.”
• Social media: Student leader Emma Gonzalez had 1.56 million Twitter followers as of April 16 of this year (compared to 920,000 followers for the 67-year-old Nature Conservancy (accredited)).
• Agility: The students launched the #NeverAgain Facebook page the day after the shooting in Parkland, Florida, and they have been quick to create memes and responses to opposition messaging, often within hours.
• Flexibility and graciousness: The survivors of the Parkland shooting embraced other young people who had different experiences and agendas, including 11-year-old Naomi Wadler from Virginia, who spoke on behalf of African American female victims of gun violence whose stories never made the front pages of newspapers.
• Celebrity engagement: The march featured such performers as Miley Cyrus and Jennifer Hudson.
• Diversity: The core group of speakers were diverse in terms of ethnicity, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status-everything except age, as every speaker at the Washington march was 18 or younger.
• Authenticity: Unlike the Keep America Beautiful campaign, whose “crying Indian” was actually an Italian- American actor from Louisiana, every speaker at the D.C. march was a victim of gun violence.
• Stories: Emotionally resonant stories were at the heart of this campaign.

What was not in evidence for this campaign but what is an essential element for most successful campaigns now are corporate sponsors. Also missing were brand names of one or more sponsoring or partnering nonprofit organizations.

Other campaigns that are worth looking at are Feeding America’s “Give a Meal,” Best Friends’ “Save Them All” and the Entertainment Industry Foundation’s “Stand Up to Cancer.”

How will we do it?

We are just getting started, and we have lots to do. In 2018, to build up momentum for the campaign, our goals are to

• develop strategic recommendations for a successful call-to-action campaign;
• conduct initial audience and message testing;
• complete a funder/partner feasibility study.

Most important, we need to start gathering the stories that demonstrate how conservation has changed people’s lives.

How you can help

As a true community, the Alliance, its members and its partners must share the work of building a national campaign. Here are a few early steps you can take:

• Tell us your land trust’s interest in participating.
• Ask us questions and give us your concerns and ideas.
• Let us know of any other campaigns in the works.
• Send any research studies.
• Send us stories and photos.

Contact me at marketing@lta.org.

Elizabeth Ward is vice president of communications at the Land Trust Alliance.