CLIMATE STRIKE. SEE YOU ON THE STREETS.

No ifs. No buts. Rally is closed on the 20 September for the Global Climate Strike.

You will find us with (hopefully) thousands of others at Millbank in London. If you’re there it would be fab to say hello.

You can find details of the most local strike to you here.

And because we like to be useful, we’ve made some A3 poster and Instagram sized graphics for you to download and use.

And if you’re making your own sign. Here’s a useful guide.

Be safe and be very noisy.

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Closed photo by Tim Mossholder on Unsplash

ARE YOU READY FOR TRUMP?

As we’re sure you all know, Donald Trump is visiting the UK next week. Because we like to be helpful, we’ve produced this simple guide to creating the best protest signs.

But don’t worry if you haven’t got the time to make your own. We’ve also produced a series of free designs for you to download, print and attach to your placard of choice.

The designs are available in a variety of sizes and colours. So, whether you’re attending the march in person or showing your support digitally – there’s something for you.

If you need the details for the London march, you can find them here.

And know your rights, this guide from Liberty has all you need to know.

Have fun, be safe and make a lot of noise.

Photo by Alice Donovan Rouse on Unsplash

MAKE NEW CONNECTIONS. SPARK NEW ANSWERS.

Last night around 70 do-gooders and troublemakers from charities, campaign groups and the world of politics descended on Newspeak House in London for our free community screening of ‘Knock Down The House’.

If you don’t know it, ‘Knock Down The House’ is a brilliant documentary that takes you behind the scenes as four determined women, including Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC to her friends), challenge big money politics in the 2018 race for Congress in the USA.

It was such an inspiring and moving film. And as we watched these four incredible women run their campaigns, there were moments of real emotion and plenty of tears in the room.

The very best thing was sharing the experience with so many talented people and hearing a diverse set of views, opinions and perspectives from the room when the film was over (expertly facilitated by Jo Kerr).

When we set up Rally we promised ourselves we’d do more to bring groups of people together. It’s too easy to go to the same events, see the same speakers and hear the same messages. We passionately believe that if we all meet people from outside of our fields, we learn new stuff, we make new connections that can spark new answers to old problems and it’s more fun. Last night was our first step towards keeping our promise and, from the buzz in social, we can already see that new connections have been made and interesting conversations have started - which has made us so very happy.

Watch this space and Twitter for details of future events.

And thanks again to all the amazing people who showed up on a Monday night and made it such a great evening.

And if you want to put on a screening, all the details on how to do it are here and here. Do it. It’s fun.

Paul

SICK KIDS. THE RESULTS...

We posted about Sick Kids a while ago and it prompted a ripple of online debate concerning its effectiveness.

So we thought you might be interested in the results. It did just fine. And from what we can remember from the talk we saw at IFC 2018, this is just the beginning.

Here’s our original post with all of the incredible films.

"WOMEN LIKE ME AREN'T SUPPOSED TO RUN FOR OFFICE..."

It seems incredible that it was only last year that AOC burst onto the scene with this incredible film. Seriously, if you haven’t seen it, take the time now to watch it.

She wrote the script to that ad: Remember, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez also wrote her own winning ad.

She has totally changed how politicians communicate with their audience (and beyond): Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez Has Mastered the Politics of Digital Intimacy.

She has mastered Instagram: How Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez keeps it "real" on Instagram.

And owns Twitter: Ocasio-Cortez is the latest Twitter powerhouse.

She’s incredible to watch and listen to, hugely charismatic, perceived as a real threat by the right and 100% our tip for future president.

And don’t forget this amazing response to some badly thought-through trolling from the right…

When we think about how our clients should communicate their vision and values to the wider world, we think about how AOC does it.

And the word that we always come back to is authenticity.

RALLY & 'NEW POWER'

I’ve found myself talking to five people last week about the New Power book.

Of those five people, only one had read it.

Which breaks my heart (ish), as I think it’s a really important book for these digitally disrupted and politically turbulent times.

So I’d love you all to read it. Or if time is tight, maybe just watch the TED talk or read this Harvard Business Review article.

I promise it will help you think about things in a different way. It certainly helped me figure a lot of stuff out when I was thinking about leaving my job and setting up Rally.

I want Rally to be a ‘New Power’ organisation. When you study this graphic I think you’ll understand why.

It looks a whole lot more fun on the right hand side as well.

Paul

SWAG FROM IRELAND

We got our first post today. Well, first post if you don’t count letters from the bank.

Our friend Damian who runs the incredible Ask Direct in Dublin sent us these badges from the Michael D. Higgins presidential re-election campaign.

Earlier in the summer we spent a day and a half in Dublin with Damian and his incredible team talking about the strategies and tactics that drive the most successful political fundraising campaigns - which they then used and built on to power the work they did on the campaign.

Today is election day in Ireland. If you have a vote, make sure you get out and use it. If you don’t have a vote, take a moment to look the #keepthepoet hashtag on twitter and get a feel for MDH’s appeal.

SICK ISN'T WEAK...

I was at the IFC last week and the SickKids presentation on Thursday took my breath away. It told the story of how SickKids in Toronto rebooted their relationship with the public to supercharge their fundraising and attract new audiences.

They did it by focussing on three key things:

1. They deliberately moved from being a charity brand to a performance brand. Think Nike.

2. They shifted their mindset from keeping up with what the charity sector does, to redefining it and winning at it.

3. They moved from the central and well used proposition of ‘Help Us’ to ‘Join Us’.

It’s that last one that resonates the most with how Rally thinks and operates. We know we’re doing our best work when we are helping clients attract and mobilise their crowd by putting their values front and centre rather than a particular fundraising product.

This is the launch film. Please watch it full screen with the sound most definitely turned up.

Kids in the hospital over the Christmas period worry that Santa doesn’t know where they are. So they made this film.

They ran this one at Mother’s Day (and it was at this point in the session where I started sobbing).

This is the latest film, launched a few weeks ago. It’s the moment in the plan where the call to action starts to focus on action - from all parts of the Toronto community.

It’s stunning work. And a real, live example of how an organisation can make its brand and fundraising work brilliantly together.

What about the results? They were amazing. And as soon as I get the slides I will update you all. But we’re talking millions of dollars.

Paul