Amy DeMaria

Senior Vice President of Communications, Cystic Fibrosis Foundation

Washington, D.C.

Amy DeMaria is Senior Vice President of Communications at the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and has spent the last past ten years transforming the way the organization tells its story to advance the search for a cure.

Since 2005, Amy has rebuilt the Foundation’s communications program, with a focus on developing a new brand identity and communications strategy to support the organization’s $175 million major giving campaign, which was unprecedented for a rare disease advocacy organization.

As part of that effort, Amy built an earned media program resulting in a ten-fold increase in positive stories about the Foundation’s innovative approach to drug development. Under her leadership, articles have appeared in publications including Forbes, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The New Yorker; and NIH Director Francis Collins went on the record praising the Foundation and its drug development model.

She successfully rebranded and repositioned the organization with a new logo and an award-winning website that led to a doubling of web traffic over five years. Amy also developed the Foundation's first social media platforms including a robust Facebook community that now includes more than 200 thousand people, despite CF affecting only 70 thousand people worldwide.

In 2012, her team developed a video that won first place in the YouTube nonprofit video awards. It was featured on YouTube’s landing page, exponentially expanding the visibility of the Foundation and raising public awareness for CF.

Previously, Amy held communications leadership positions at Georgetown University Medical Center, Georgetown University and at the global communications firm Porter Novelli. Amy has also worked on the Clinton/Gore campaign and as a political appointee in the Clinton Administration for Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala. She received a bachelor's degree from Emory University and studied marketing and management at Georgetown University School of Business. She frequently speaks at industry events about nonprofit marketing, communications and digital innovation.