How Truescope Became an Extension of Northern Illinois Food Bank’s Media Team

At a Glance

• Consolidated two separate media monitoring providers into one platform with hands-on support
• Monthly strategy calls with the Truescope team ensure coverage is captured accurately and reports evolve with the organization’s needs
• Detailed media reporting from Truescope now ladders up to the executive team and board, and helps secure new and returning event sponsors

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The Company

Northern Illinois Food Bank is one of 200 food banks in the Feeding America network, serving 13 counties across a 7,000-square-mile area around Chicago. Last year, the organization delivered 93 million meals and reached an average of 572,000 neighbors every month through its 900 member agencies, which include food pantries, shelters, and senior nutrition programmes.

Katie Heraty is the Director of Media Relations, responsible for proactive and reactive media relations, messaging, video content, and maintaining a catalogue of neighbor and volunteer stories used across fundraising, advocacy, and partner communications.

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The Challenge

Two providers, no alignment, clunky workflows

When Katie joined three and a half years ago, the food bank was working with two separate companies for media monitoring and reporting: Truescope for monthly insights reports, and another platform for monitoring. Having two providers meant two different contacts at two different organisations who did not always work in sync. As Katie describes it, "the setup felt a little antiquated and clunky."

Katie explored Cision and Meltwater as alternatives, and the existing provider made a counter-offer to retain the business. But the reporting from Truescope had already become central to how the team measured and communicated its media results, and the working relationship was strong. When Truescope began offering monitoring services alongside its reporting, Katie saw an opportunity to bring everything under one roof with a team she already trusted.

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The Solution

One platform with hands-on monthly strategy support

The transition was straightforward. Katie consolidated monitoring and reporting into Truescope, giving her a single platform and a single team to work with.

What sets the relationship apart is the ongoing, hands-on support. Katie holds a 30-minute call each month with the Truescope Customer Success team to review the coverage in the platform, flag upcoming events and press releases, adjust search terms, and ensure nothing slips through the cracks. It is a working session, not a status update.

Over time, the two have reworked the reporting format together. When a new Chief Philanthropy Officer joined and wanted to see the dollar value of media coverage, Katie and the Customer Success team restructured the reports to better quantify the value of earned media coverage. The reports have continued to evolve as the team's strategy matures.

Between the regular strategy calls and responsive day-to-day support, Katie describes Truescope as a genuine extension of her media team.

"Truescope is an extension of my media team. It's not just a tool, it's a partnership that shows up in our results."
— Katie Heraty, Director of Media Relations, Northern Illinois Food Bank

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The Impact

Media reporting to the board and data-driven sponsorship proposals

Truescope provides detailed media metrics that feed directly into Northern Illinois Food Bank's executive team and board updates, giving leadership a clear line of sight into the value of earned media.

That data also plays a critical role in securing event sponsorships. The food bank runs four signature fundraising events each year and needs to demonstrate the media value of sponsorship to attract and retain partners. When pitching Aldi as a returning presenting sponsor for a flagship event, Katie used Truescope data to show it generates on average 10 million media impressions. The same data supports proposals for new sponsors and event participants, strengthens corporate partnerships, and adds value to our stakeholder communications.

Beyond events, the philanthropy team shares clips and coverage data with donors to demonstrate the impact of their contributions. And Katie uses county-level placement data to ensure awareness efforts are reaching the right communities across the food bank's 13-county service area.