The Member-Story Playbook

Chapter 0 · How to use this playbook

This is not a manifesto. It is a working document. Each chapter ends with a concrete output: a form, a triage rule, a draft structure, a press room checklist, a Monday report. By the end of week four you should have a repeatable engine that does not depend on any one person remembering to do anything.

We have ordered the chapters by the week most teams need them. Chapter 1 is for the first Monday. Chapter 12 is for the quarter you have been running long enough to spot patterns. If you are picking this up mid-quarter, jump to whichever chapter solves the problem on your desk today and come back for the rest.

A note on scale. Everything in this playbook works for a comms team of one and a membership of fifty. It also works for a team of six and a membership of three thousand. The variables are which intake channel you turn on first, how many approval lanes you set up, and how strictly you triage. The principles do not change.

Chapter 1 · Make submission painless or it will not happen

Members will not log into a portal that requires a password reset every six weeks. They will not fill in a fourteen-field form. They will email you a screenshot of a flyer and assume you can take it from there. Plan for that reality, not the one in the brand book.

The most reliable intake is a single branded form with six fields: headline idea, what is happening, when it happens, who to quote, useful context, and images or files. Add a consent checkbox so you can use the material in a press release, social post and press room story without chasing permission later.

Send the link once a month with a plain subject line: 'Got news we can help amplify?' Keep the reminder short and give three concrete examples: a new opening, a community project, a funding win. Specific examples produce better submissions than broad calls for news.

Output for the end of week one: a live submission form, a one-line monthly reminder template, and a private channel where the comms team can see new submissions as they land. Nothing else.

Chapter 2 · Choose single-story or multi-voice

A single member story works when the news is genuinely standalone: a launch, a hire, an award, a major investment or a human story with one strong subject. Pitch it on its own and give the journalist a clean, focused release.

A multi-voice release works when several submissions point in the same direction. Three hotels reporting strong spring bookings. Four manufacturers announcing apprenticeship hires. Six charities responding to the same policy change. A row of independents preparing for a seasonal trading moment.

The multi-voice version is often stronger because it gives the journalist a trend, not an advert. Use one lead quote from the organisation, two or three member quotes, and a short evidence paragraph that explains why the pattern matters now.

Rule of thumb: if you can fit five submissions on one page and a sceptical journalist would read it and think 'there is a story here', combine. If only one of those submissions makes them lean forward, run that one solo and hold the others for next month.

Chapter 3 · Triage with the three-bucket rule

Put every submission into one of three buckets: pitch now, combine, or hold. Pitch now means the story has a clear deadline or enough news value to stand alone. Combine means it should sit with similar submissions until you have a stronger trend. Hold means it is useful background but not a press story yet.

Do not let the fourth bucket appear. The fourth bucket is 'maybe later' and it becomes the pile that ruins Friday afternoon. If you cannot decide in ninety seconds, ask one clarifying question and move it to hold until the member replies.

Run triage once a week, at the same time, with the same person leading it. Twenty minutes on a Tuesday is enough for most teams. The discipline is more valuable than the duration.

Output: a one-page weekly triage log showing which submissions went into which bucket and why. Three months in, this log is also your evidence pack for the board: it shows volume, judgement and follow-through.

Chapter 4 · Draft in the member's words, not yours

AI drafting saves time, but the releases that get picked up are the ones with real member quotes in a recognisable voice. The comms manager's job is editorial: sharpen the headline, cut repetition, protect the quote and keep the facts clean.

Use two passes. First pass: structure and facts. Get the chronology right, check the spellings, confirm the numbers. Second pass: voice and quote. Read the quote out loud. If it sounds like every other corporate quote you have ever read, rewrite it with the member on the phone.

A useful release structure is: headline, one-sentence standfirst, why now, member quote, proof point, organisational quote, practical details, media contact. For a multi-voice release, put the pattern before the individual examples so the journalist understands the story immediately.

Two drafting habits to refuse: never use the word 'excited' in a quote, and never bury the location. Local press cares about place. National trade press cares about pattern. Both want the human first.

Chapter 5 · Build the press room before you pitch

Every pitch should point to a tidy press room or website page, not a bundle of attachments. Include the release, quotes, image downloads with credits, spokesperson details, background notes and any partner links a journalist might need.

The same content can then be reused as a website story, a partner email and a social post set. A good member-story workflow does not stop at the press release. It creates the assets your team needs for owned channels too.

If you only build one piece of permanent infrastructure this quarter, build the press room. It is the asset that compounds. Every story you put on it makes the next story easier to publish.

Chapter 6 · Use the media lists you already own

You almost certainly already have a list of journalists who cover your patch or sector. It is in someone's inbox, a spreadsheet, or last year's agency handover. Clean that before paying for a giant database.

Segment it by beat: local business, travel desks, sector trade, community, broadcast, regional features. A small, well-segmented list with relevant pitches will outperform a large bought list almost every time.

If you do add external media-list data later, treat it as a supplement rather than the system. The expensive part is not the contact record, it is keeping the relationship useful enough that the journalist opens the next email.

Audit the list quarterly. People move desks, papers close sections, freelancers change beats. A thirty-minute spring-clean is worth more than another database subscription.

Chapter 7 · Pitch in three sentences, not three pages

The pitch email is not the press release. It is the elevator to the press release. Three sentences: what is the story, why now, where is the full pack. Anything else is the journalist's time you are wasting.

Sentence one is the news, in plain English, with the place and the human. Sentence two is the angle the journalist's readers will care about. Sentence three is the link to the press room and the named contact reachable today.

Do not attach the release. Do not paste the release into the body. Do not start with 'I hope this finds you well'. Send the pitch from a real person at a real address. If you would not send it like this to a journalist you respect, do not send it to one you do not yet know.

Chapter 8 · Handle the follow-up without becoming a nuisance

One follow-up is fair. Two is borderline. Three is the reason you will not get the next pitch opened. Build your weekly rhythm so a single follow-up at a sensible hour is enough.

If you have to chase, do it with something new. A fresh data point, an additional quote, the partner organisation's confirmation, a photo that has just come in. 'Just bumping this' is not a follow-up. It is an admission you have nothing to add.

Track responses in a way the whole team can see. If a journalist declines twice for the same reason, that is a list-segmentation problem, not a pitch problem. Move them off that beat or stop pitching them stories they do not run.

Chapter 9 · Report on engagement, not vanity

Build the board report around activity that proves value: how many member submissions came in, how many were drafted, how many were pitched, which journalists opened or clicked, where coverage landed, and which members were named.

Reach is context, not the headline. Named outlets, named members and repeatable evidence are more credible than inflated totals. The strongest board slide is often a table of members who would not have been visible without the organisation's comms team.

If you are reporting AVE (advertising value equivalent), stop. It overstates value, gets laughed out of editorial conversations and trains your board to expect numbers nobody else respects. Replace it with share of voice within a fixed peer set and a list of named outlets.

Chapter 10 · Run the monthly 30-minute stand-up

Four agenda items, thirty minutes, once a month. What landed last month, what is in the inbox, the one bet for this month, what to stop doing. That is the meeting that replaces a standing weekly comms call.

The meeting only works if someone prepares the page the day before. One page. Headlines from coverage, current submissions, pitches in flight, deadlines that cannot move. Decisions get made in the room because the homework is already done.

The 'what to stop' item is the one that earns the meeting its keep. Five minutes asking what the team did last month that did not produce value, and then stopping it. If you do nothing else from this playbook, do this.

Chapter 11 · Plan for the bad month, not just the good one

Every comms team has a month where two members pull out, the lead pitch gets killed by an unrelated news story, and the campaign you spent two weeks on lands with one regional outlet. Plan for it before it happens.

Hold a 'rainy day' folder: two evergreen member stories you can pitch when the pipeline is empty, one data-led story you can refresh quarterly, and a list of three journalists who reliably open well-targeted pitches. These are not B-tier stories. They are the stories you keep dry for the week when nothing else works.

Reframe a quiet month in the board report honestly. 'We held two submissions for stronger combination next quarter' is more credible than padding the pack with weak coverage. Boards trust comms teams that admit a quiet month and explain it.

Chapter 12 · After 90 days, look for the patterns

Three months in, you will start to see which member categories submit consistently and which never do. That is your most useful insight. It tells you where to invest the next round of intake design, the next round of partner relationship work, and the next round of board reporting.

Look at which pitches journalists opened twice. Look at which outlets ran the most coverage. Look at which members reused the press room link on their own channels. Each of those signals tells you where the engine is working and where you need to put a hand on it.

Write a one-page quarterly note for the team and the board. Three things that worked, two things to retire, one experiment for next quarter. Keep the note short, keep the cadence regular, and the engine will keep itself honest.

Appendix A · The submission form, field by field

Field 1 — Headline idea (free text, 120 characters). 'What would you like us to say about this?' Asks the member to attempt the headline themselves. Their attempt is often better than yours because they know what makes their business interesting.

Field 2 — What is happening (free text, 600 characters). Plain English description. Not a press release. Not branded language. The reporter's first question.

Field 3 — When does this happen (date / date range / 'ongoing'). Tied to your editorial calendar so triage knows what is dated and what is evergreen.

Field 4 — Who can we quote (name, role, mobile, email, availability). The single most common reason a story dies is a missing reachable human. Make this required.

Field 5 — Useful context (free text, 800 characters). Background, links to previous coverage, related campaigns, anything that helps you frame it.

Field 6 — Images or files (upload, multiple). Optional but encouraged. Include a consent line on the upload field for image rights.

Appendix B · The release template, line by line

Headline: news verb, place, human or organisation. 'Five Manchester independents extend opening hours for festival week'. Not 'Local BID supports member businesses'.

Standfirst (one sentence): the so-what. Why this matters now, to whom, with what evidence. The journalist reads this and either keeps going or deletes the email.

Why now (one paragraph): the timing. The event, the season, the policy change, the data drop, the launch date. Anchored in something the reader's audience already cares about.

Member quote (one paragraph): the human voice. First-person, specific, contains at least one detail nobody else could have said. Read it aloud before sending.

Proof point (one paragraph): the supporting evidence. Numbers, named businesses, comparable previous activity. Sources and dates inline.

Organisational quote (one paragraph): the strategic frame. Why the organisation chose to amplify this story, what it represents about the wider sector.

Practical details (bullets): dates, times, locations, prices, links. Anything a reader might need to act on. Keep them scannable.

Media contact (one line): named person, mobile, email, available hours. Never 'press@'. Always a real person reachable today.

Appendix C · The board report, slide by slide

Slide 1 — Summary paragraph. One short paragraph answering: what changed this quarter, why it changed, what we are doing next. No charts yet.

Slide 2 — Named outlets, named members. A table: outlet, story, member named, date. No reach figures. Boards trust outlets they recognise more than numbers they cannot sanity-check.

Slide 3 — Share of voice, fixed peer set. A simple bar chart against three or four pre-agreed peer organisations. Rolling three-month average.

Slide 4 — Activity, output, outcome. Three columns. Activity: submissions, drafts, pitches. Output: coverage, opens, press room visits. Outcome: members named, member sentiment, renewal evidence.

Slide 5 — The honest line. One paragraph naming the campaign or pitch that did not work and what you learned. This is the slide that builds long-term board trust.

Slide 6 — One bet for next quarter. The single story or campaign you will put extra effort behind. Name the headline you hope to read in twelve weeks.