The Future of Campaigning - 28 Oct 10

Social Media and Campaigning
Rachel Beer,
Director, beautiful world
28 October, 2010

Strategic Drivers
Driver 1: Growth of consumer activism
Driver 2: More fluid activism
Driver 3: Growth of new technologies
Driver 4: ‘Professionalisation’ of campaigning
Driver 5: Increase in competition and coalitions
Driver 6: Marginalisation of dissent
Not time to cover all, so I’ll focus on 1, 2, 3 & 4
Source: ‘Future Focus: What will campaigning be like in 5 years’ time?’ by NCVO

Co-creation, not control
Social media – and emerging media – facilitates co-creation and ownership of campaigning between NGOs and activists (by which I mean anyone who wants to take part in whatever way, not necessarily the archetypal physical kind of protest that can be associated with activism).
I'm interested in how charities should best manage this going forward – the tension between a certain abbregation of control and the need for someone to facilitate to ensure campaigns have real impact.

“The Internet is tailor-made for a populist, insurgent movement… [its] roots in the open-source ARPAnet, its hacker culture, and its decentralized, scattered architecture make it difficult for big, establishment candidates, companies and media to gain control of it. And the establishment loathes what it can't control. This independence is by design, and the Internet community values above almost anything the distance it has from the slow, homogenous stream of American commerce and culture.
Joe Trippi, author of ‘The Revolution Will Not Be Televised: Democracy, the Internet, and the Overthrow of Everything’

“The mantra has always been, 'Keep your message consistent. Keep your message consistent’…
That was all well and good in the past. Now it's a recipe for disaster …
You can choose to have a Stalinist structure that's really doctrinaire and that's really opposed to grassroots. Or you can say, 'Go forth. Do what you're going to do.' As long as we're running in the same direction, it's much better to give some freedom.”
John Hlinko, who has participated in Internet campaigns for MoveOn.org and the electoral primary campaign of Wesley Clark

“Charities provide an important rallying point and level of consistency for campaigns which ultimately ensures the longevity of a campaign and determines the success of that action.
The former director of campaigns at Greenpeace, rightly points out that the grassroots activities of the anti-roads movement in the eighties and nineties quickly lost steam for lack of central support and direction.”
Steven Buckley,
Head of Communications and Brand,
Christian Aid

Learnings from Christian Aid ‘Mass Visual Trespass’

The Overview
Objective: To send a message to the British Government to take the Copenhagen Climate Change Summit seriously.
Channels: Aweb site aggregating Flickrimages, Twitter and video messages.
The Ask: Create a message to Gordon Brown asking him to attend the summit
Christian Aid promised to project some of the images onto power stations, House of Parliament etc., so your online action would appear offline in a place you'd probably get arrested if you tried it personally!
The outdoor projection was unique because it had video.

The Learnings
Response was high compared to otherChristian Aid campaigns.
Steven Buckley says, “We set upVideoboostations for supporters to leave messages. All of our testing had been people would want to leave a silent message – e.g. flipping over a message written on cardboard on. Instead, supporters came prepared with impassioned scripts and acted in the true beliefthat Gordon would see their message.”

The Learnings
“For me, this was the future of campaigning – we were controlling the ask, but not the message. Supporters were rallying behind us, but could say what they wanted to. There was a belief this would make a difference and we were leveraging technology not for its own ends but for what we wanted to achieve.”
With thanks to Steven Buckley,Head of Communications and Brand, Christian Aid

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VA4dctONpGE

Amnesty Burma Petition

Making the ask simple to maximise response…

This campaign just closed with 8,000 video signatures.
It also has a fundraising element, which is ongoing.

A great example…

Greenpeace kit kat

Look at the impact on search

What can we learn from one of the most effective online campaigns?

Sources: The Independent, BBC News, Facebook.com

Jon Morter, a part-time rock DJ and logistics expert from South WoodhamFerrers, near Chelmsford, said, "I think it just shows that in this day and age, if you want to say something, then you can – with the help of the internet and social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter. If enough people are with you, you can beat the status quo."
Sources: The Independent, BBC News, Facebook.com

Which tools to use?

Think people first
Base your choice of tools on your audiences and their behaviours
Which channels/media do they use?
What else do you know, and can you learn, about them?
How do people use these tools/what for?
Understand, and keep on top of, trends in media
Know demographics of the main platforms – and be clear about how this fits with achieving objectives
E.g. Is there any point in using Foursquare if Facebook Places will reach higher volumes of relevant people?

Facebook users in the UK

Twitter users in the UK

Why use…
Twitter
Disproportionately noisy
Full of influencers
Fast and furious
Facebook
Most users – by far – of any social network/media
Incorporates a wide variety of functions – e.g. photos, places, tagging
Highly customisable
YouTube
The place to watch video online
Ranked highly in Google search
Can embed into a range of other platforms – e.g. your blog, Facebook

And listening online can help you find out where your supporters and stakeholders are discussing the issues…

Some tracking & listening tools and services
October 30, 2010
www.hellobeautifulworld.com

Influencing the influencers

People are more 90% more likely to trust the recommendations of people they know…… and 70% more likely to trust the recommendations of independent individuals
Source: Nielsen, 2009

Influencers
According to the Institute for Politics, Democracy & the Internet, "Online Political Citizens” are "seven times more likely than average citizens to serve as opinion leaders among their friends, relatives and colleagues… Normally, 10% of Americans qualify as Influentials. Our study found that 69% of Online Political Citizens are Influentials.”

Do you know who your online influencers are?

Helps you to understand your impact and who influences that

Another very useful tool to understand which of your calls to action have the most impact and with whom
Helps you to understand your impact and who influences that
And don’t forget to use your

‘Free Agents’

Free Agents
Defined by Beth Kanter as,
‘A person (many times a GenY, but not always) who is a passionate about a social cause, but is working outside of a nonprofit organization to organize, mobilize, raise money, and engage with others.
Free agents are also fluent in social media and take advantage of the social media toolset to do everything organizations have always done, but outside of institutional walls.’
For more of Beth’s insights on ‘Free Agents’:http://beth.typepad.com/beths_blog/freeagent/

Blog action day
Started by Collis & Cyan Ta'eed in 2007. Handed over to Change.org in 2009

A company run by free agents for free agents

“I Like it on…” Facebook campaign
For Breast Cancer Awareness month.
A spokesman for Breast Cancer Care, which is not affiliated with the campaign, said:
“viral campaigns have great potential for increasing consciousness… we’d like to see this go further. We would encourage people to direct their Facebook friends towards support and information to create better breast awareness … or to check their breasts regularly when they explain what the campaign is about.”
Source:EmaxHealth.com 6 Oct ‘10

Trafigura, Guardian and Carter-Ruck became a trending topic
Helped by clever use of hashtags –searchable and viral
A victory for the principle of press liberty
Source:Telegraph.co.uk

Trafigura, Guardian and Carter-Ruck became a trending topic
Guardian Editor, Alan Rusbridger, broke news of the success of the campaign on his own Twitter account ahead of a planned court hearing:
"Victory! #CarterRuck caves-in. No #Guardian court hearing. Media can now report Paul Farrelly's PQ about #Trafigura.”
Helped by clever use of hashtags –searchable and viral
A victory for the principle of press liberty
‘… there was enough information publicly available for tens of thousands of Twitter users to work out the focus of the injunction and post messages of protest identifying the parties involved.’
Source:Telegraph.co.uk

Free Agents
How well do you currently engage with them?
How can you make the most of their motivation?
How do you balance the need to give direction to your campaign and – critically – achieve its objectives, with their need for autonomy?

Maintaining and Developing Engagement

Steven Buckley, Christian Aid
“The world has moved on from the standard campaign route of postcards and e-actions (though those remain important and effective, the former particularly so).
In the age of social media people's association with a campaign is far more visible… getting involved is one of the tribal badges you wear.
The risk isthat the level of engagement is nothing more than a that, and it's a whole lot less effort than writing a postcard & walking to the post office.”

“For that reason, many commentators dismiss e-actions. It's so easy to delete an inbox of email protests, less so to dismiss piles of postcards spilling over the doorstep at number 10 (my partner accidentally spilt several thousand postcards on the No 10 carpet when handing over a protest recently).
I'm not sure I agree – e-campaigning helps scale the protest/campaign quickly and reaches out to people who may not have been otherwise involved.”

“The trick is in taking supporters to the next level of engagement. What can people do other than send an e-action, RT a tweet, or like a Facebook page (in all likelihood without ever looking at the link away from that page)?”

Forrester
Technographics:
Ladder of Engagement
Source: Forrester Research

What about the audiences you engage with?
?
How do they engage?
What tools do they use?
?
?
?
How do you encourage them to increase their engagement?
?
Which action are they most likely to take next?
Why not develop your own methodology?

And then use it to monitor and benchmark your success…

Don’t get too hung up on volume. A smaller number of more engaged and active supporters may be more effective…

‘Never doubt that a small group of committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.’
Margaret Mead, anthropologist, author andcommitted activist, 1901-78

Campaigning has much to learn from marketing, fundraising about supporter development

Marketing and fundraising can take inspiration from the innovation, bravery and pace of campaigning

Collaboration, co-creation and integration between disciplines is key……for charities and their supporters

Christian Aid Supporter Day:Campaigning meets stewardship?

Opportunity to donate
Email bulletin

N.B. Christian Aid has shared photos but supporters have not added theirs to the pool (yet). Flickr is still a great way for the charity to share content, regardless, even if not user generated

Campaigners can be donors too

Fundraising should be integrated into the options for supporting that you offer
(We’ve all moved on from calling them donors or campaigners now, haven’t we?)
Don’t be afraid to ask or assume that supporters will be annoyed or offended

Source: www.gapingvoidgallery.com

Our role
“To help translate individual actions into collective actions”, says NCVO
To engage supporters and stakeholders
Provide a range of ways to support a campaign from simple, low engagement methods – e.g. retweet – to more time-consuming, higher engagement methods – e.g. petition, offline actions
To encourage supporters to engage again, and at the ‘next level’
To develop an infrastructure that supports campaigning with sustainable impact

Questions to ask yourself
‘Does your organisation present a range of options(individual and collective) for supporters to engage?’
‘How can your organisation provide a spectrum of engagement to all supporters including those who may not be interested in your wider mission?’
‘How can your organisation sustain longer-term involvement from individuals who show an interest in your cause?’

Strategic Drivers
Driver 1: Growth of consumer activism
Driver 2: More fluid activism
Driver 3: Growth of new technologies
Driver 4: ‘Professionalisation’ of campaigning
Driver 5: Increase in competition and coalitions
Driver 6: Marginalisation of dissent
Not time to cover all, so I’ll focus on 1, 2, 3 & 4

Opportunities & Threats

Consumer activism & individualism
Self-motivated, requiring instant gratification, attention poor
How do we overcome tendency towards ‘slacktivism’? Are we helping to create it through providing insufficient opportunities to engage more deeply or through not understanding and responding to motivations?
Is the ease of taking an actiona barrier to taking another action? Are we setting the bar too low in favour of volume?
How do we harness their initial motivation and retain their interest/passion in the longer-term?
How to leverage the power of many weak ties present in online social networks whilst developing stronger ties, and deeper engagement?

Changing technology
How to we keep up-to-date or, better, ahead of the game when things are changing so quickly?
Do we risk alienating or neglecting some audiences if we focus too much on new channels or is it an equal risk to rely on channels that are becoming outmoded?
Can we help our audiences to access, adopt and understand new technologies to help them help us achieve our campaigning or related objectives?
Useful for socially excluded/marginalised communities (Google ‘Savvy Chavvy’ for an example)
Or for connecting groups around the country that would otherwise be operating separately (e.g. The Women’s Café, run by WRC)

‘Professionalisation’ of campaigning
Do we accept that this is necessary to have a greater impact, or would that make campaigning too ‘establishment’ to engage activists? Do we risk becoming too much like the organisations we are campaigning against when we should be differentiating ourselves more to counter their astro-turfing?
How to achieve balance between the activist’s character that drives us, and helps us to ‘speak’ to campaigners, and become more ‘professional’? What does ‘more professional’ even mean – how is this different to what we do already?
How do we foster a culture of collaboration with other disciplines without slowing down our ability to react quickly to changing circumstances?

Connect with me:
Twitter: www.twitter.com/rachelbeer
Email: rachel@hellobeautifulworld.com
Slides: www.slideshare.net/rachelbeer
On most social media as ‘rachelbeer’
www.hellobeautifulworld.com

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The Future of Campaigning - 28 Oct 10

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