Superior Rotary Club 40

Our Rotary club just got through the month of January, which had been designated Rotary Awareness Month. That prompted me to ask how we have promoted awareness of Rotary and how we could improve our effectiveness in letting others know what Rotary is and what it does.

We all get the idea that there’s a link between our awareness and our actions. For example, if you could remove all sensory input to your body except for moving around, you would run into something and hurt yourself or worse. That basic example supports stating that “awareness must precede action”. But is it a one-way deal? Doesn’t action produce awareness too? After all, actions speak louder than words but to whom do they speak?

Our Rotary club, maybe most all Rotary clubs, believes that our many good deeds and wonderful actions increase public awareness of who we are and what we do. My observation is that the awareness created is too little, focused on things other than Rotary, doesn’t last and all told isn’t strong enough to sustain our club’s regional identity into the future. Why is that the case?

One reason is that our actions speak loudly to us but very softly to others beyond our view. That’s sometimes referred to as becoming a “legend in your own mind”, and as a result our actions increase personal awareness far more than public awareness. So if it’s our vision to create public awareness of Rotary state-wide, country-wide and even world-wide, we’ll have to complement our tremendous worldwide actions with small but consistent pieces of “*gorilla marketing” to get our message out.

That’s not as big an effort as it might sound. Start with something simple such as wearing your Rotary pin every day you’re out in public. Put a Rotary decal on your vehicle. Carry a few of those “What’s Rotary” cards with you. When somebody asks “What’s Rotary?” give them a card but don’t stop there because that card will only convey idea awareness.

Have in your mind an “elevator speech”, a 30-second statement about Rotary. I suggest using Who rather than What to frame your answer in personal terms: Thus: a) Who are we?; b) What do we do?; c) What makes us unique/special?; and c) How can you learn more about us? Personal awareness will produce public awareness but it only works one person at a time. That’s why we need every member’s involvement.

*Do a search for the book by the same name