How can your nonprofit share a better story?

If we were to ask you who the recipient of your charity is, who would it be? What do they look like? Where do they live, and what kind of life do they lead? Are they male or female? What fills their days? Why do they need your charity, what challenges do they face?

And the golden egg question: how best do you represent them through your organisation’s media? While nearly every charity is seeking to be a force of good in the world, it’s not often that we sit back and consider the who behind a charity. The why? Certainly. But how we engage with, and represent the who, is all-too-often left unspoken and unheard. We believe this matters at Jersey Road, which is why we have put together this guide to help us all share better, more authentic and engaging impact stories.

1. Understand the context

Every charity or NGO gravitates towards a specific people group, community or individual. Sometimes this framing can be helpful; it shapes our thinking to consider who we are trying to support. It leads us to know who our target audience is, and the needs that we are striving to overcome.

That said, there is also a flip side. In development circles, there is a theory known as the danger of a single-story*, of homogenisation, or in other words, only hearing one side of the story. The complexity, the nuance, the richness, is missing.

If we cast our minds back to the Ethiopian famine of 1983-85, this period triggered a series in development of creating a one-track story when detailing the realities of extreme poverty. While their intentions were likely to portray the real, devastating impact of poverty and starvation, our minds and our media were flooded with images that were at best, undignified, and at worst, an exploitation of a vulnerable person’s human rights, their suffering displayed for all to see.

Fast-forward a few decades, and the narrative changed. A narrative framed around beaming smiles, revealing the impact of international aid organizations. Individuals and communities (typically women) are depicted as industrious, hard-working, and ever-thankful for the loan or other gift they have received. Herein, their story ends - they are set for life with this generous donation. Yet in reality, we know that everyone’s story is more complex than that. With twists and turns along the way, none of us is a picture-perfect example of a before and after. To portray anyone’s story as such, would be a disservice to the culture(s) and contexts we all inhabit.

2. Ethics and safeguarding have to be front and centre

In 2025, we are seeing a gradual shift away from these models, but there is always more we can unpack, and consider, with an analytical, yet hope-filled lens. For instance, the notion that the hardest-hitting story should be deployed as an appeal as it generates the most money. Our beliefs around integrity and dignity surrounding this everyday issue should challenge the usual appeal status quo. At the very least, it must be done with the highest standards of ethics and safeguarding. After all, how many of us would want the hardest chapters of our lives to be used, and potentially abused, by strangers?

Instead of individuals having their life story shared far and wide (and we must bear in mind that these experiences are often traumatic), we have to move towards a better story. One where the individual can share their own narrative. For all of its complexities, nuances and richness. Where they own the power and agency in the how and the why.

3. Consider the practicalities

At Jersey Road, we are all about telling a better story. We exist for the purpose of supporting charities and NGOs to communicate stories with impact.

However, for that to happen, we have to be introspective, considering how and why we are sharing their stories, be it for an appeal, a press release or a reel on social media.

While the narratives and methods in which we share our stories are constantly evolving, we have one shared constant: for organisations to be effective in their communications, we must advocate with the highest standards for the people we aim to serve.

We've put together some pointers to help frame your thinking and discussions as an organisation or NGO:

• Can you use their own, even unedited, quotes?

• Can the individual or parents in question select the photos that will be shared of their family?

• Have you considered alternatives to photography, like an animated image, if anonymity is required?

• Have you collaborated with local community leaders, with a consciousness of cultural sensitivity and awareness?

• Can you provide some context to their story when it’s shared, avoiding over-simplifying their ‘before and after’?

• Have you protected their identity if needed, using pseudonyms where possible?

• How will you report back on how their story was used?

Overall, the question we must keep asking is: is there a better way to share a story? It's a question, and an action, we must keep engaging with. For the best stories never grow old. But how we share them is continually changing, and as impactful organisations, we must grow and evolve too.

*Articulated brilliantly by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

By Lizzi Joyner, Account Manager, Jersey Road
Graduate of the University of Sussex in International Development