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Public Outreach

At its most basic, public outreach is communication that seeks, not to persuade or sell, but to actively involve communities in understanding and making decisions about their future whenever large-scale projects or programs are undertaken.

In this way, it differs from:
• Public relations, which, for the most part, seeks to “get the story out” to the community, many times via the media.
• Advertising and marketing, which seeks to “get the message out” or “sell a message” to individuals and consumers.

Unlike these other forms of communication which are mainly one-directional, public outreach is multi-directional.

Public Outreach, also referred to as Public Involvement, involves give-and-take. It involves listening, receiving and working with others to shape specific projects, programs, neighborhoods, cities and even whole regions and reach an accord.

With 30 years experience as a communications specialist, Mary Schnack has been involved in community relations and public outreach for most of her professional life. She has first-hand knowledge of the tools and techniques of public outreach and has completed the certification courses offered by the International Association of Public Participation (www.IAP2.org)

The Tools of Public Outreach
As a professional discipline, public outreach uses some of the same tools of public relations and marketing, but with a different intent and focus. Services provided by Mary Schnack & Associations include:

• Planning –Assisting government agencies, corporations, nonprofits and other entities to better define their goals and objectives for large-scale projects using traditional planning meetings or interactive, “off-site” imaginative, role-playing sessions. Helping assess factors involved in change and helping identify obstacles, challenges, needs, stakeholders and other factors. From this, an overall plan and a timeline are created.

• Focus Groups –A great method to see where the market is before spending a lot of money in developing new products or providing new services. It can be beneficial for a company to have a neutral third party gather information from the public about their services or product (in a focus group). Our work with focus groups includes:

• focus group creation, logistics and management
• questionnaires and collateral materials
• analysis of data and exit interview

• Community Relations – The creation of “hot lines,” on-site offices, outreach teams, technical assistance and other techniques are used by public outreach practitioners to help create “street level” contacts to better reach the public, increase the speed of collecting information and reach out to all facets of a community, including those who do not want to attend meetings.

• Communications – Interactive websites, social media, project “newspapers,” email bulletins, mailers, flyers and the traditional use of media advertising and public relations provide basic communication channels that accompany other outreach tools.

• Events – Community fairs, simulation games, public hearings, open houses, field trips, expert panels and other events provide interactive environments for in-depth community involvement. Mary Schnack has completed charrette training with the National Charrette Institute.