Blog Post #8- PR experience with Komen on the Go

I figured I would talk a little about my experience at working for Komen on the Go bus.

First of all, I didn't know that "Susan G. Komen for the Cure is the world's largest and most progressive grassroots network fighting to end breast cancer forever" and that it is the "world's largest breast cancer organization." Taken from the volunteer handout- pretty impressive.

Here's the link for the Susan G. Komen for the Cure website. Most of the topics under "Get Involved" were the ones volunteers and bus visiters learned about through video.

As volunteers, before the bus came, we received a few papers dealing with background information, but mostly about thanking us for giving up our time to help out. In my opinion, this is a great example of public relations. This made we want to work harder and reach more people, and I was happier to be doing my job.

My job was simple: After taking 15 minutes to view the computer education on the bus, I had to go to a public venue, hand out pink stickers, make people aware of the bus's location and invite people to visit.

What I learned: College is an excellent place to pitch for a cause. Before coming to TCU, I was passively taught (by various people, adults mainly) that people who go door-to-door, people who want to come up and talk to you, and telemarketers, just want money. The best thing to do is avoid and ignore them. In college, people are still trying to find what causes they want to participate it and where they stand on certain points. These guys are more willing to sign up for more information, hear a small pitch, or check out a booth for five minutes. They aren't too busy in the real world, yet, I suppose. It would be nice if we continued to have this attitude after college as well.

It's pretty brave for people to put themselves out there and make small interruptions in others' daily schedules, especially when they run the severe risk of getting bluntly and discouragingly rejected (multiple times). But because I experienced working for a cause, even if it was handing out stickers and pitching for just one hour, I'm now more willing to hear what other people have to say.

And as we learned in class, tactics have to be evaluated for their successfulness. As I said before, it looks like TCU is a good place for people to hear out a cause. First, everyone seemed pretty enthusiastic and interested in the bus. Now for the statistics: In all, I was handed about 50 stickers to give out. In under an hour, I had gotten rid of every single one, and only one person refused my offer.

...Who refuses a simple sticker? It's not that challenging to wear one... Maybe she had her reasons, and at least she was nice about it. And she was the only one, which I would say is a pretty good success rate.