The Congressional Black Caucus Foundation (CBCF) is non-profit public policy research and educational institute founded in 1976. For more than four decades CBCF’s programs and events support our focus on eliminating health, economic and education disparities impacting the global black community. CBCF’s mission is to advance the global black community by developing leaders, informing policy, and educating the public.
CBCF is achieving the mission by:
• Facilitating the exchange of ideas and information to address critical issues affecting our communities.
• Providing leadership development and scholarship opportunities to educate the next generation of leaders.
• Promoting public health and financial empowerment for all communities through innovative programs.
• Developing strategic research and historical resources for the public, academics, educators, and students.
CBCF’s programs reach and attract citizens from across the country and around the world. Its most recognizable program is the Leadership Institute, which comprises the scholarship, fellowship and internship programs, which attract hundreds of young leaders from colleges and universities nationwide. CBCF is seeking support for implementing a world-class marketing and communications strategy and executing our strategic plan that builds awareness for CBCF around the work it undertakes to eliminate disparities in Black communities demonstrating CBCF’s contributions and impact. The selected firm should have experience with small nonprofit organizations looking to collaboratively embrace innovation, provide solutions, and drive tangible success. Firms should have demonstrable experience working in government affairs and policy. Moreover, the ideal firm will have a strong cultural attunement of Black experiences, including racial, economic, and social justice issues. This engagement is a partnership, and as such, CBCF is looking for a firm to seamlessly integrate and collaborate with the CBCF MarCom team with responsiveness, flexibility, creativity, and efficiency.
Scope of Work:
In your response, please demonstrate your understanding, capability and approach to either or both of the tasks listed below.
• Task 1: Earned, owned and paid media Create a public relations strategy that will allow CBCF leadership to cultivate an enhance meaningful relationships with targeted, high-level external audiences, affiliated audiences, including mainstream and minority media as well as key influencers in the academic, health and business communities. Weekly hourly estimation: 10-20 hours/week.
o Develop robust strategic plan to use earned, owned, and paid media to reach targeted audiences
o Help establish relationships with local, national, tier one, and niche Black media outlets to ensure coverage of the program and its goals
o Create and develop interactive strategies and engaging social content to include, but not limited to animation, video editing, content support and infographics
o Monitor media traction, pick-ups, and sentiment using tools such as Talkwalker, Crimson Hexagon, etc. and provide timely actionable summaries of earned media coverage and social media trends
o Perform analytics to determine effectiveness of media
• Task 2: Brand refinement, refresh and graphic design services Refine and refresh CBCF’s brand enabling and equipping the foundation with a visual identity to aid in the broadening awareness of its programs and priorities and increase the visibility of its programs and research across key audiences. Weekly hourly estimation: 20 hours/week.
o Refine and refresh CBCF’s brand identity
o Establish and codify style guidelines and brand standards
o Create a collateral template toolkit and for staff and members
o Organize a graphics library system to host toolkits, social media, email and web communications
o Reflecting the refined and refreshed brand, develop wireframes and a new CBCF site design that implements an intuitive and easily navigable information architecture and incorporates best practices of a user experience-centered design
o Ad-hoc graphic design support as requested
PROPOSAL PACKAGE Proposals must provide the following information and documents to be considered complete. Proposals not to exceed 20 pages in length.
1. Firm profile and executive summary Contact information and a brief description of the firm.
2. Approach Description and approach to the services requested in the Scope of Services section. If the firm cannot provide a specific service requested, the firm will indicate this in the response and have the option of proposing an alternate service. 3. Key personnel and qualifications Bios of key personnel who will be assigned and perform the work of this contract. Please highlight unique skills, abilities, and knowledge pertaining to the proposed tasks as well as the specificity of CBCF’s mission and work.
4. References List of at least three (3) references from the Offeror’s clients and for whom the Offeror provides marketing, strategic communications and media relations services of the types described in this RFP (including the names and contact information of specific individuals who may be contacted). Please also include a brief description of the services provided.
5. Samples and Portfolio A minimum of five (5) examples of the work and/or case studies. Of these examples, at least three (3) must demonstrate work outlined in the scope of services (i.e. earned, owned and paid media, brand refresh, and website redesign).
6. Fees and Expenses Provide budget breakdown by task. The Foundation will be billed a monthly retainer which shall compensate the firm for work performed on behalf of the Foundation. Examples of reimbursable expenses include shipping expenses and copying up to 10 cents for color ledger. Examples of expenses that are not reimbursable, absent express approval, include computerized research, data hosting, overhead expenses and overtime expenses (including meals and transportation). The Foundation is not obligated to pay for work we have not authorized.
EVALUATION CRITERIA
• Quality and content of proposed scope of work
• Project costs (economical and practical)
• Firm’s unique qualifications and perspectives
• Firm’s ability and capacity
• Past relevant experience
• Reputation and references
• Women-owned, minority-owned, and/or small business
Due Date:
December 23
Address:
Nadia Monroe Executive Office 202.263.2800 nmonroe@cbcfinc.org
Relevant agencies to consider includes Hunter PR and Edelman PR.