Digital & Earned Media

Digital & Earned Media

Freedom to Marry played the leading role in shaping the national narratives that grew support and created the climate for legal and political advances. In this section, you’ll find resources detailing how we used digital and earned media to build and engage the marriage movement, tell the stories of families and messengers who exemplified why marriage matters, and make the case in the court of public opinion.

  • Using Digital to Build the Marriage Movement

    Freedom to Marry’s use of digital played a critical role in the organization’s work and the implementation of its national strategy, the “Roadmap to Victory.” The digital team supported the campaign’s focus on rapidly accelerating the growth in public support for marriage, mobilizing supporters into an effective movement, and making the case for marriage in the court of public opinion.

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  • Earned Media: State Support and The Press Room

    Central to winning state campaigns is the need for strong “earned media” capability. Earned media consists of all media the campaign doesn’t directly pay for: newspaper stories, editorials and op-eds, television and radio news coverage, and the like. Given the very high cost of paid advertisements, all campaigns must rely on earned media to drive a narrative forward, accentuate victories, explain losses, and demonstrate forward momentum.

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  • Earned Media: Driving the National Narrative

    Central to driving a national narrative forward is the need for strong “earned media” capability. Earned media consists of all media the campaign doesn’t directly pay for: newspaper stories, editorials and op-eds, television and radio news coverage, and the like. Given the very high cost of paid advertisements, all campaigns must rely on earned media to drive a narrative forward, accentuate victories, explain losses, and demonstrate forward momentum.

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  • Digital Action Center - Building State Campaigns

    As Freedom to Marry began working aggressively to win marriage in more states and shape the development and execution of state-level legislative, public education and ballot campaigns, an urgent need to support state-level marriage campaigns with little to no capacity in digital became apparent. What began as offering one-off support to a handful of states ultimately turned into the Digital Action Center—the central hub of digital organizing within the marriage movement.

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  • Raising Donations Online to Fuel Freedom to Marry’s Work

    Beginning in 2010, Freedom to Marry placed a bigger emphasis on strengthening its digital presence including building a robust email program. With that enhanced digital program came a more intentional focus on generating donations online – given that Freedom to Marry was now becoming the actual central campaign and would need to raise not just more money, but “c4” political money as well as the “c3” tax-deductible public education money it had previously confined itself to. Between January 2010 and August 2015, we raised more than $3 million in online donations from more than 18,000 supporters.

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  • Digital Storytelling: Spotlighting Same-Sex Couples and Other Messengers Online

    A vital component of Freedom to Marry’s campaign to win marriage for loving, committed same-sex couples nationwide was conveying again and again – in many different ways - why marriage matters and to whom it matters. Much of Freedom to Marry’s storytelling work was concentrated, or originated, online. Through written online profiles, videos and advertisements, placements in traditional media outlets, and social media, Freedom to Marry was able to consistently and authentically showcase the faces of people from all across the country who needed to be able to say “I do,” marry in any state they chose, and be sure their marriages would be respected by the all states and the federal government. Our central goal was always to spark and frame the millions of conversations we knew that we would need to change hearts and minds, build momentum and a critical mass of support.

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  • Using Online Video To Make the Case for the Freedom to Marry

    Telling emotionally powerful stories in compelling ways was a central element of our strategy: building a critical mass of public support for the freedom to marry (ultimately, we grew support from 27% in 1996 to 63% in 2015). People are hardwired to connect to stories and those stories can inspire action, generate donations, change hearts and minds and build bases of support. One of the most effective ways of telling stories in the digital is through the use of video.

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