Lobby Day or Advocacy Day Organize a lobby or advocacy day. If your advocacy plan involves affecting legislation, arrange meetings with their elected officials and equip your advocates with the messages you need carried. It is the constitutional right of a citizen to petition the government officials about a specific issue. Exercise that right and educate your advocates to do the same. They will tell their story and their elected officials will listen. Webinar Series Webinars are a terrific way to educate your advocates about what is happening within your organization, and can also be a wonderful resource or outlet for patients and advocates to hear from healthcare professionals about their disease. You can also archive these on your website so others can view them later. Tip: www. gotomeeting.com has an easy to use program to host your webinars. Social Media Provide your advocates with suggestions on ways to best utilize social media outlets. Encourage your advocates to use social media to invite people to a local event, or post pictures of the meetings they have with their elected officials. They can also use social media to share important news stories. You can make it super easy for them to post information by providing sample posts, such as watching a video and providing the link, or encouraging them to take action. Consider developing a social media calendar with pre-determined content/posts to share daily.
Public Meetings Encourage your advocates to attend local legislative and regulatory meetings in their hometowns that are open to the public. They can visit the government website for their county or state to learn about upcoming public meetings. You can assist them by working together on crafting the appropriate message for each type of meeting. Advocacy Scholarships Tell your advocates that patient advocacy scholarships are available. Very often companies and organizations will provide scholarships for patient advocates to attend scientific meetings to learn more about their disease. Here are some examples of scholarship programs: http://www.healthline.com/ health/diabetesmine/innovation/ patient-voices-contest http://www.cancer.net/research- and-advocacy/patient-advocates/ conquer-cancer-foundation-patient-
advocate-scholarship-program www.patientadvocate.org/index. php?p=69 https://aakp.org/press-release/ scholarships-available-kidney- patients-national-meeting/
Online Calendar Provide an online, yearly calendar of events that your advocates can view and add their own events to. This is a great way to inform your advocates about your organization’s activities. Encourage them to check the calendar regularly to learn more about on-going activities.
PETITION: A request that addresses of a person or group of people in authority.
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