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Revised 8/2016
Ruritan Public Relations Guidelines
Formerly distributed as a separate manual.
Section 1: Understanding Public Relations
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Anything that is new or novel in the community.
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Anything that is important to a large number of people in the
community.
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Events involving important figures in the community.
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Events or happenings that deal with the community’s future.
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Community improvement projects. Community fairs.
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Involvement with community youth.
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Community sports events, especially youth athletics.
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Annual fundraisers for community service work.
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Community awards or honors.
What Makes Publicity?
The Difference Between Publicity
and Public Relations
Ruritan has been called the best kept secret in
America, and with good reason. Although not as
well-known as other community service organiza
tions, more than 28,000 Ruritan members in
twenty-four states enjoy the Ruritan spirit of
“Fellowship, Goodwill, and Community Service”.
Despite the efforts of dedicated Ruritan clubs across
the nation, relatively few people know how Ruritans
improve America’s communities. Gaining recognition
for your club’s community service achievements is
crucial to gaining new members and increasing the
effectiveness of your local club.
Publicity and public relations can also help your club
accomplish more than ever within the community.
Before your club can start realizing the benefits
of publicity and public relations, you need to
understand the relationship between these two
principles.
Publicity is “public attention.” In other words, publicity
is the attention and recognition your Ruritan club
should be earning for its dedicated efforts to improve
the community. To gain the public’s attention, your
club must learn how to build a
relationship
with the
community. The first step to building any successful
relationship are establishing trust and sharing
information.
These are the basic elements of a public relations
program.
Webster’s Third New International Dictionary
(1986) defines public relations as “the degree of
understanding and goodwill achieved between an
individual, organization, institution, and the public.”
If you read the Objectives set forth in Article II of the
Ruritan Club Bylaws, you’ll discover that Webster’s
definition comes close to describing the established
objectives of the Ruritan organization.
Establishing a public relations campaign in your
community does not necessarily require a heavy
investment of your club’s finances. A public
relations campaign is simply distributing your
Ruritan message to businesses, institutions,
and the community at large, with the purpose
of establishing goodwill and support within your
community.
Any Ruritan club public relations program should
inform the community about what your club has
contributed to the community in the past (such
as improvements to the local park, helping the
elderly, sponsorship of youth programs, etc.) as
well as what your club intends to accomplish for the
community in the future.
What Your Club Gains from Public Relations:
Publicity
After your Ruritan club has established the
goodwill and support of the community through
a public relations campaign, publicity will surely
follow. If the media and the public at large are
aware of your club’s previous contributions to the
community, they will be more likely to lend support
to your current or future projects. Remember,
Ruritans can always use support from their
communities, whether it
takes the form of increased
patronage at fundraisers,
increased media coverage
in the area, or increased
membership from new
volunteers who take the
Ruritan message to heart.
Publicity can yield many
benefits for your club and
your community. With
increased publicity, local
businesses are more
likely to donate materials
or funds to your club’s
projects. Businesses
may also be willing to co-
PR