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Ashleigh has joined the COCO team for a 12-week period and hit the ground running as soon as she started - her second day was spent covering the social media for our annual Steve Cram Celebrity Golf Day. We caught up with Ashleigh to find out how things are going 6 weeks into her post.
What made you want to work with COCO?
Having grown up in South-Africa and Zimbabwe, and with experience of working in community engagement roles, I have a strong understanding of the challenges faced by communities of colour, particularly women. I am interested in the empowerment of African women, across the African diaspora, and believe this dream can only be realised through education and economic means and that this must be community led. I wanted to work on something short term as I start my MBA at Newcastle University in September 2019, and as this short-term project was available, and the work that COCO do in East Africa is inspiring to me, this felt like a perfect match.
What are you hoping to achieve in your time with COCO? The COCO office is run by a small team who achieve so much despite having the barriers many small charities face – not enough staff, funding cuts, and lack of time!
I can see how hard they are working and hope to maximize their efforts by spreading their message far and wide with a few tweaks to their comms.
I have experience of running digital media campaigns for my own clients as well as corporate and charitable organisations, such as Newcastle University.
What are your plans for working with COCO? I am reviewing all COCO social media channels and digital presence and writing a report with recommendations on what can be done to help the charity reach their strategic goals through the power of digital marketing.
I have introduced some of my favourite tools like CANVA which helps to create colourful graphics quickly and easily, and these have been a hit with our supporters!
What has been the highlight of working with COCO so far?
Well I have fully immersed myself in all things COCO! As most COCO supporters will know, our CEO Lucy Kendall is rather persuasive, and I have already found myself zooming around a golf course in a buggy taking snaps and signing up for the Great North Run!
I’m going to be running the Great North Run alongside my brother, who is much fitter than me, although he’s a great inspiration and coach. I’d like to unashamedly take this opportunity to request sponsorship if anyone would like to support me – I know I’ve got a lot of cookies to bake!
As someone who uses social media a lot in their work, what is your favourite social media platform and why?
Although I use a wide range of social media platforms, my favourite is LinkedIn which I believe to be underutilised – particularly by charities. Audiences are less trusting of ‘official’ voices of charities and organisations, and using influencers to tell the story of a charity in their own words is a huge opportunity to maximise engagement. I am also a HUGE fan of Hootsuite which helps you to manage multiple platforms in one space – this allows you to see how different types of content is performing across social media channels, to ensure that the best possible content is offered to our readers.
How can COCO supporters contact you?
If you have any feedback on COCO digital marketing or content suggestions please drop me a line at ashleigh@coco.org.uk .