Transmedia Activism
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Transmedia Activism site has launched
The website for transmedia activism is now launched and open-sources the basic framework to be strategic and proactive in the use of media to create social impact. The framework encourages addressing social change first when using actionable content (essentially flipping the model of media first, outreach second), for collaboration on issue identification and storytelling between activists and content producers, and for embedding transmedia strategy from the start of a campaign.
Before creating a campaign, three foundational areas must be explored:
A. Social Change- what are you trying to change?
B. Storytelling- what is the narrative thread?
C. Resources- what do you have?
In setting up a campaign, these areas are explored and used as the basis for a plan:
A. Audience Segmentation- who are you engaging?
B. Resources- what do you need?
C. Story Universe Strategy- how do you define the story?
D. Content Strategy- how will you craft and distribute content?
E. Partners and Stakeholders- who will participate?
F. Engagement- how do you engage toward change?
With thanks to Vicki Callahan for all her help in creating the site, taking stewardship of the model and disseminating the framework.
Before creating a campaign, three foundational areas must be explored:
A. Social Change- what are you trying to change?
B. Storytelling- what is the narrative thread?
C. Resources- what do you have?
In setting up a campaign, these areas are explored and used as the basis for a plan:
A. Audience Segmentation- who are you engaging?
B. Resources- what do you need?
C. Story Universe Strategy- how do you define the story?
D. Content Strategy- how will you craft and distribute content?
E. Partners and Stakeholders- who will participate?
F. Engagement- how do you engage toward change?
With thanks to Vicki Callahan for all her help in creating the site, taking stewardship of the model and disseminating the framework.
The Stop Rape Now Campaign
Two years ago, Eve Ensler, Founder of V-Day and author of the Vagina Monologues, addressed a United Nations panel on sexual violence in conflict zones, asking “What is it about rape that isn’t grabbing people’s imagination, isn’t seizing people’s conscience or isn’t getting people to stand up?” As a result of that meeting and subsequent advocacy work by a number of UN-related agencies and governmental actors, the UN Security Council passed Resolution 1820, demanding complete cessation of sexual violence against civilians in conflict and post-conflict zones.
On the first anniversary of the resolution's passage, an interagency initiative of the United Nations is ramping up its campaign to seize people's conscience and engage them through a dynamic web campaign that allows participants to demonstrate support for the primary points of the resolution: Mass rape is not a necessary outcome of war; and sexual violence is a security problem that requires a security response, and is not simply a gender issue, but an issue that bears on the sustainability of peace agreements and post-conflict reconstruction.
The campaign's action toolkit is simple and manageable, yet engaging. The most viral part of it is the photo upload action, which in this case is more effective than an online petition would be. Site visitors are asked to participate by taking a photo of themselves with their arms folded in an 'X' and uploading it to a generally geolocated spot on a global map. As more photos are uploaded, the site becomes rich with images of people resisting and supporting with the solidarity of repeated gestures. For an issue that hasn't received the attention and intervention it should have in the past, this campaign is one good entry point to rectify the oversight.
On the first anniversary of the resolution's passage, an interagency initiative of the United Nations is ramping up its campaign to seize people's conscience and engage them through a dynamic web campaign that allows participants to demonstrate support for the primary points of the resolution: Mass rape is not a necessary outcome of war; and sexual violence is a security problem that requires a security response, and is not simply a gender issue, but an issue that bears on the sustainability of peace agreements and post-conflict reconstruction.
The campaign's action toolkit is simple and manageable, yet engaging. The most viral part of it is the photo upload action, which in this case is more effective than an online petition would be. Site visitors are asked to participate by taking a photo of themselves with their arms folded in an 'X' and uploading it to a generally geolocated spot on a global map. As more photos are uploaded, the site becomes rich with images of people resisting and supporting with the solidarity of repeated gestures. For an issue that hasn't received the attention and intervention it should have in the past, this campaign is one good entry point to rectify the oversight.
Transmedia Activism Workshop at the Open Video Conference
The Open Video Conference, in New York City on June 19-20, 2009, will bring together artists, activists, academics, technologists and entrepreneurs to explore issues of transparency, collaboration and decentralization in online video. On Day 2 of the conference, Vicki Callahan (Founder of the Conceptual Studies program at Universty of Wisconsin at Milwaukee), Lotje Sodderland (creator of Planet of Slums, a multi-authored web documentary in production) and I will conduct a hands-on workshop on Transmedia Activism, entitled "Creating a Cross-Media Platform for Social Issue Campaigns." We will explore parts of the transmedia activism framework specifically related to online video creation and distribution, and how the strategic use of those tools advance a social change campaign.
The conference promises to be engaging and thought-provoking. Conference speakers include: Clay Shirky, Ted Hope (Film producer, Adventureland), Lance Weiler (The Workbook Project), Nina Paley (Sita Sings the Blues) and Sam Gregory, Program Director of Witness. Hope to see you there.
(Cross-posted with Feminism 3.0.)
The conference promises to be engaging and thought-provoking. Conference speakers include: Clay Shirky, Ted Hope (Film producer, Adventureland), Lance Weiler (The Workbook Project), Nina Paley (Sita Sings the Blues) and Sam Gregory, Program Director of Witness. Hope to see you there.
(Cross-posted with Feminism 3.0.)
Transmedia Activism and Planning
Beth Kanter has written a very interesting blog post taking my article on transmedia activism one step further, looking at business planning and networks. Three very interesting points have arisen from her post so far:
First, Beth poses a question about business planning to build and facilitate co-creation networks, which, as I commented on her site, drives home the point that for organizations to use storytelling to effectively engage and energize community, they have to build/position their internal capacity and create external networks to manage co-creation in the first place. (The underlying problem that remains is how do you do this with minimum cash and resource outlay while still ensuring maximum outreach and stakeholder/network stewardship?)
Second is the question of how someone carrying out a transmedia activism campaign can balance managed vs. organic growth of the story universe. Since I've started looking at strategic planning for this process, I've found it helpful to proactively plan the process while still allowing room for inclusion of unsolicited content and organic growth of the story universe. (As I noted there, though, content creation from a number of decentralized authors raises aesthetic, technical and ownership issues, among others).
Third is the question of influence of content creators vs. content sharers (and how do you measure that influence?). Beth posts a very interesting graph by Gary Hayes that weights being "perceived" more heavily than creation-- so sharers wield more influence than creators. I agree with that in spirit: I don't view content creators as having "less" influence than sharers, but impact and participation are linked in this process so it is dependent on sharing, distribution and entry points into the story universe. But creators wield a separate kind of influence on this process in the ability to shape the content and its effect on perceptions.
First, Beth poses a question about business planning to build and facilitate co-creation networks, which, as I commented on her site, drives home the point that for organizations to use storytelling to effectively engage and energize community, they have to build/position their internal capacity and create external networks to manage co-creation in the first place. (The underlying problem that remains is how do you do this with minimum cash and resource outlay while still ensuring maximum outreach and stakeholder/network stewardship?)
Second is the question of how someone carrying out a transmedia activism campaign can balance managed vs. organic growth of the story universe. Since I've started looking at strategic planning for this process, I've found it helpful to proactively plan the process while still allowing room for inclusion of unsolicited content and organic growth of the story universe. (As I noted there, though, content creation from a number of decentralized authors raises aesthetic, technical and ownership issues, among others).
Third is the question of influence of content creators vs. content sharers (and how do you measure that influence?). Beth posts a very interesting graph by Gary Hayes that weights being "perceived" more heavily than creation-- so sharers wield more influence than creators. I agree with that in spirit: I don't view content creators as having "less" influence than sharers, but impact and participation are linked in this process so it is dependent on sharing, distribution and entry points into the story universe. But creators wield a separate kind of influence on this process in the ability to shape the content and its effect on perceptions.
3 Generations: The Power of Storytelling in Social Change
Three Generations helps survivors of genocide and crimes against humanity tell their stories, and provides an avenue for the world to hear them. The organization is built on the principle that storytelling transforms lives. As Jane Wells, the organization's Founder, says in a blog post for The Hub on WITNESS, "[s]tories remain with us long after conflicts and wars have ended, not just as evidence, but also by giving a human dimension to the often unimaginable."
Three Generations relaunched its website last week in conjunction with April's Genocide Prevention Month activities, creating a beautiful and simple storytelling platform that honors the victims and survivors of atrocities. Particularly noteworthy is that the organization, while curating and editing its content for aesthetic and technical value, endeavors to take away other filters and allow the storytellers to recount their experiences "without agenda, as they would like to tell them." This makes the content that much more compelling. Three Generations' video shorts, stills and text together provide a strong example of how storytelling can be effective (and rapid) in translating the "unimaginable" to audiences-- and how spare and evocative content can draw viewers directly into another's world (and engage them into deeper change efforts).
(Note: Three Generations is a client.)
Three Generations relaunched its website last week in conjunction with April's Genocide Prevention Month activities, creating a beautiful and simple storytelling platform that honors the victims and survivors of atrocities. Particularly noteworthy is that the organization, while curating and editing its content for aesthetic and technical value, endeavors to take away other filters and allow the storytellers to recount their experiences "without agenda, as they would like to tell them." This makes the content that much more compelling. Three Generations' video shorts, stills and text together provide a strong example of how storytelling can be effective (and rapid) in translating the "unimaginable" to audiences-- and how spare and evocative content can draw viewers directly into another's world (and engage them into deeper change efforts).
(Note: Three Generations is a client.)
SXSW Observations
The SXSW Interactive and Film festivals in Austin, Texas, were a whirlwind of ideas and activity, and the small but significant segments devoted to nonprofit and social innovation issues presented food for thought. While most of what I saw left me generally hopeful (perhaps because I didn't hear much about our current economic or funding crises), many of the panels made me think we still have challenges in the social change sector in the way we do our work, how we define it, and how we aim for change. Here are a few brief takeaways from the panels and hallway conversations:
As a sector, we still have work to do to clarify the distinction between charity and social good/systemic change. The "Social Media for Social Good" panel, in particular, led off with stories of fundraising and good deeds on behalf of individuals, as opposed to scalable social change. I'm not making a value judgment against fundraising here (had they titled the panel "Social Media for Fundraising," I would have had less of a problem with the focus-- though I will continue to argue the prevailing system of fundraising needs a major overhaul). But I and a few other attendees later voiced the view that charity is an entry point, not an endpoint, in sustainable social change. In other panels, I heard general discussions of impact measurement, but no discussion on how nonprofits and activists could set up or measure those metrics-- or fundraise to pay for the time and effort it takes to carry out impact measurement. There was little discussion about presenting evidence of change, even in the storytelling panels- and only heard one mention of the need to make a specific connection from engagement to actual change. (With regard to the storytelling panels, most of what I happened to see concentrated on ad-driven and brand-supported storytelling, so I won't discuss that now.)
Similarly, many of the proposed solutions that panelists discussed throughout the festival would largely affect the same socioeconomic strata as the attendees. Besides the panels devoted to mobile applications for social good in developing regions, there wasn't much attention to scaling solutions to other socioeconomic classes. Neither was there much discussion of ground-level innovation and scalability of those solutions, except in those same panels. And as Katrin Verclas of MobileActive.org pointed out, there was far more attention given to development and marketing of more applications and more products, and less to the development of enabling and instilling platforms along socioeconomic fault lines for existing products and services.
On the numerous discussions about social media, it appeared that some people position social media as a discipline itself. To state the obvious, social media is a tool and a platform to enable and enhance communications. I'm not sure why social media is still being pulled out from larger communications strategies (for surely the novelty of social networking is wearing off by becoming ubiquitous?), but if so, we need to start seaming it back in. The only exception to this would be the discussions on access, diversity and participation in social networking. Proposed solutions mostly centered on the creation of affinity groups, which seem to belie the point of integration on the web. If affinity groups connect immediately to larger, cross-participatory groups, this strategy may work. Simply creating silos may solve the access and participation problems-- but this won't go far in terms of integration and the cross-cultural dialogue that the web is otherwise well-suited to provide.
The good news is that, despite the economic and cultural challenges we face, I felt a general sense of action and positive movement. The panels I most enjoyed and would revisit are: The Ecosystem of News: Change V2 (Lawrence Lessig inspiring discussion of his newest project, www.change-congress.org) and the three panels devoted to mobile technology and social good, Appfrica; Mobile Web for Good; and Mobile Ubiquitous Banking.
As a sector, we still have work to do to clarify the distinction between charity and social good/systemic change. The "Social Media for Social Good" panel, in particular, led off with stories of fundraising and good deeds on behalf of individuals, as opposed to scalable social change. I'm not making a value judgment against fundraising here (had they titled the panel "Social Media for Fundraising," I would have had less of a problem with the focus-- though I will continue to argue the prevailing system of fundraising needs a major overhaul). But I and a few other attendees later voiced the view that charity is an entry point, not an endpoint, in sustainable social change. In other panels, I heard general discussions of impact measurement, but no discussion on how nonprofits and activists could set up or measure those metrics-- or fundraise to pay for the time and effort it takes to carry out impact measurement. There was little discussion about presenting evidence of change, even in the storytelling panels- and only heard one mention of the need to make a specific connection from engagement to actual change. (With regard to the storytelling panels, most of what I happened to see concentrated on ad-driven and brand-supported storytelling, so I won't discuss that now.)
Similarly, many of the proposed solutions that panelists discussed throughout the festival would largely affect the same socioeconomic strata as the attendees. Besides the panels devoted to mobile applications for social good in developing regions, there wasn't much attention to scaling solutions to other socioeconomic classes. Neither was there much discussion of ground-level innovation and scalability of those solutions, except in those same panels. And as Katrin Verclas of MobileActive.org pointed out, there was far more attention given to development and marketing of more applications and more products, and less to the development of enabling and instilling platforms along socioeconomic fault lines for existing products and services.
On the numerous discussions about social media, it appeared that some people position social media as a discipline itself. To state the obvious, social media is a tool and a platform to enable and enhance communications. I'm not sure why social media is still being pulled out from larger communications strategies (for surely the novelty of social networking is wearing off by becoming ubiquitous?), but if so, we need to start seaming it back in. The only exception to this would be the discussions on access, diversity and participation in social networking. Proposed solutions mostly centered on the creation of affinity groups, which seem to belie the point of integration on the web. If affinity groups connect immediately to larger, cross-participatory groups, this strategy may work. Simply creating silos may solve the access and participation problems-- but this won't go far in terms of integration and the cross-cultural dialogue that the web is otherwise well-suited to provide.
The good news is that, despite the economic and cultural challenges we face, I felt a general sense of action and positive movement. The panels I most enjoyed and would revisit are: The Ecosystem of News: Change V2 (Lawrence Lessig inspiring discussion of his newest project, www.change-congress.org) and the three panels devoted to mobile technology and social good, Appfrica; Mobile Web for Good; and Mobile Ubiquitous Banking.
Is Fundraising Dead?
Maybe, maybe not. At the very least, in this climate of limited resources and jittery giving, traditional fundraising techniques are not serving well. We in the social issue community are rethinking how we ask, how we give and how we generate both funds and impact. The exercise of reevaluation is revolutionizing the field-- and traditional fundraising techniques are starting to look outdated.
Larry Keeley of Doblin spoke a few weeks ago at the Strategic Innovation Lab (sLab) at the Ontario College of Art and Design, about the role designers play in innovation. He called on us (designers and non-designers alike) to engage in platform thinking to conceive and prototype new futures. Within the context of design and innovation, Larry defines platforms as integrated offerings that create a unique and holistic user experience only loosely controlled by the platform owner. And even in the midst of a recession, Larry argues, there's never been a better, more dynamic time to engage in innovation and platform thinking, given both the widespread availability of tools and the current societal will to collaborate.
I've been thinking about platforms ever since that conversation. In the context of sustainable social change generally, the most effective platforms are integrated offerings that scale globally and across sectors, creating movement toward a just and equitable future shaped according to local values. Those platforms need supportive platforms that allow for dynamic and sustained resource generation and community engagement (through communication, storytelling and demonstration of impact). The following platforms look like they will emerge as the strongest ways to move the needle forward:
1) Donor engagement: Creating donor-centered infrastructure, in which donors' expectations and goals are directly integrated into the core of an initiative's mission and programs. This applies most often to high-level donors, requires active stewardship and communication-- and is akin to a partnership model.
2) Peer-to-peer fundraising: Funds are raised through grassroots networking, individual to individual. Twestival (Twitter-based fundraising for charity:water) is the most recent example of this. (Beth Kanter presents a thorough look at this effort on her blog.)
3) Open source activism: This is a phrase used by musician, activist and filmmaker Justin Dillon (Call and Response) to describe his efforts to increase participatory action and idea generation for social change.
4) Open source philanthropy: Increased availability and sharing of information in and among key stakeholders. GFEM has created a media database to connect media projects with funders on an open platform. Larry Keeley has also worked with the Rockefeller Foundation to innovate philanthropic giving and due diligence.
5) Impact investing: Creating global investment portfolios that maximize both financial return and non-financial benefits of scalable solutions to social and environmental problems. (A more grassroots example of this is HopeEquity.org, which creates micro-endowments that generate interest on capital.)
(Thanks to Michael Dila and Robin Uchida of Torch Partnership, a brilliant strategy and innovation firm and a sponsor of sLab, for inviting me to attend the sLab series. The exposure to Torch's work on cross-sector collaboration has enriched my own strategy practice. Thanks also to Jill Finlayson of the Skoll Foundation and socialedge.org, who has inspired our cross-site dialogue about issue fatigue, fundraising, media engagement and donor engagement platforms.)
Larry Keeley of Doblin spoke a few weeks ago at the Strategic Innovation Lab (sLab) at the Ontario College of Art and Design, about the role designers play in innovation. He called on us (designers and non-designers alike) to engage in platform thinking to conceive and prototype new futures. Within the context of design and innovation, Larry defines platforms as integrated offerings that create a unique and holistic user experience only loosely controlled by the platform owner. And even in the midst of a recession, Larry argues, there's never been a better, more dynamic time to engage in innovation and platform thinking, given both the widespread availability of tools and the current societal will to collaborate.
I've been thinking about platforms ever since that conversation. In the context of sustainable social change generally, the most effective platforms are integrated offerings that scale globally and across sectors, creating movement toward a just and equitable future shaped according to local values. Those platforms need supportive platforms that allow for dynamic and sustained resource generation and community engagement (through communication, storytelling and demonstration of impact). The following platforms look like they will emerge as the strongest ways to move the needle forward:
1) Donor engagement: Creating donor-centered infrastructure, in which donors' expectations and goals are directly integrated into the core of an initiative's mission and programs. This applies most often to high-level donors, requires active stewardship and communication-- and is akin to a partnership model.
2) Peer-to-peer fundraising: Funds are raised through grassroots networking, individual to individual. Twestival (Twitter-based fundraising for charity:water) is the most recent example of this. (Beth Kanter presents a thorough look at this effort on her blog.)
3) Open source activism: This is a phrase used by musician, activist and filmmaker Justin Dillon (Call and Response) to describe his efforts to increase participatory action and idea generation for social change.
4) Open source philanthropy: Increased availability and sharing of information in and among key stakeholders. GFEM has created a media database to connect media projects with funders on an open platform. Larry Keeley has also worked with the Rockefeller Foundation to innovate philanthropic giving and due diligence.
5) Impact investing: Creating global investment portfolios that maximize both financial return and non-financial benefits of scalable solutions to social and environmental problems. (A more grassroots example of this is HopeEquity.org, which creates micro-endowments that generate interest on capital.)
(Thanks to Michael Dila and Robin Uchida of Torch Partnership, a brilliant strategy and innovation firm and a sponsor of sLab, for inviting me to attend the sLab series. The exposure to Torch's work on cross-sector collaboration has enriched my own strategy practice. Thanks also to Jill Finlayson of the Skoll Foundation and socialedge.org, who has inspired our cross-site dialogue about issue fatigue, fundraising, media engagement and donor engagement platforms.)
Storytelling for Change: The Most Significant Change technique
Sean Howard made me aware of an innovative storytelling tool geared toward change/needs assessments, called the Most Significant Change (MSC). This technique is a form of participatory monitoring and evaluation that can be applied across a number of social issues.
The process--invented by Rick Davies nearly 14 years ago to meet challenges associated with monitoring and evaluating a complex participatory rural development program in Bangladesh-- involves the collection of significant change stories from participants and staff at the field level, followed by systematic selection of the most significant of these stories by designated stakeholders or staff. Once changes have been captured, various people sit down together, read the stories aloud and have regular, in-depth discussions about the value of reported changes and emerging patterns of focus. When the technique is implemented successfully, teams of people focus their attention on program impact.
This is the basic process:
1. Start and raise interest
2. Define domains of change
3. Define reporting period
4. Collect SC stories
5. Select most significant stories
6. Feed back results of selection process
7. Verify of stories
8. Quantify
9. Secondary analysis and meta-monitoring
10. Revise the system
I am particularly interested in the MSC technique because of its similarities to Appreciative Inquiry, a technique for change or growth strategy and organizational design that I like within in my own strategic planning practice. Also, Sean and I have been working together to create a program geared toward systemic change, using innovations in design thinking, visualization, user experience, organizational design and storytelling. We've been researching successful models of communication and evaluation- and the MSC technique is interesting in terms of systemic change. As Sean pointed out, the MSC technique has most often and successfully been applied vertically within organizations, but there are also valuable outcomes from that can arise from bringing external stakeholders into the process, such as enhanced donor engagement and partnership evaluations, which the user manual acknowledges in its section entitled "Innovation: Network Alternatives."
(Part of this comment is cross-posted from the ResistNetwork. Image taken from Rick Davies' blog.)
Summary: "Preaching to the Converted": Engaging Your Audience and Combating Issue Fatigue
I moderated an online discussion on ArtTribesNetwork, on engaging your audience to combat issue fatigue. The discussion participants were from The Fledgling Fund, Cinereach, the Center for Social Media at American University, The Skoll Foundation, Global Grassroots, The Tiziano Project, the NYC Leadership Academy and the Miami International Film Festival, as well as two independent filmmakers (Brian Glazer, Producer of What We Got: DJ Spooky’s Quest for the Commons, and Marilyn Perez) and a social media expert (Howard Greenstein). We fleshed out some interesting ideas during the hour.
The transcript is online at ArtTribesNetwork.com. Here is a brief summary of the discussion:
Causes of issue fatigue
We briefly discussed causes of issue fatigue (also calling it compassion fatigue or psychic numbing). One reason audiences might disengage from a cause is their perception that there has either been no effective activism strategy put into place, or that there is no effective intervention or forward movement arising from activist efforts.
Another currently relevant reason is the economic crisis that affects our interests at home, which cause audience members to focus less on “distant” issues.
Similarly, issue fatigue hits audiences for causes that are large (hitting vast numbers of people) and/or “removed” from audience members’ daily lives faster than for issues to which they can relate personally or which center on one person in particular.
Keeping issue fatigue at bay
Discussion participants detailed their recommendations for keeping their audiences interested and committed. While you can’t necessarily apply the same questions and strategies to social issue media projects that have disparate or unique goals, the participants did come up with an overarching framework for most social issue media campaigns.
(1) Start with
(a) An exceptionally committed outreach team
(b) Sufficient resources to carry through your outreach and engagement plans
(c) A select, interested audience that will help you move the issue forward by engaging in activism and increase audience numbers by spreading the word, and
(d) Clear outreach goals for each audience segment.
(2) Given that issue fatigue hits when audience members feel disconnected, audience members must feel as if they belong to the movement and feel ownership over the outcome of activist efforts. Our participants talked about the importance of creating a personal, emotional connection to the cause through
(a) Visual imagery,
(b) A strong narrative that focuses on the story of one affected person (be that a witness, victim or survivor), and
(c) The opportunity to contribute through user-generated media.
(3) Social issue media campaigns built on slow, collective and continual action are most effective. The more people are exposed to the message through multiple media, the more likely they'll be to respond and/or take action. Therefore, campaigns must provide a pathway to action through creative opportunities for engagement.
It helps to engage in transmedia efforts, by continually creating and delivering new media, information, technologies and opportunities in order to maintain attention, through multiple distribution channels (traditional as well as digital and online), along with the opportunity to engage personally and collectively, in the real world.
(4) To communicate with your base, participants agreed that web 2.0 tools and social networks create an instant, global audience and deliver media and information most effectively. Digital communications tools are particularly useful for convening people virtually; sharing information, resources and referrals; getting attention; and inviting participation. In addition, you can encourage your audience to promote your message to their contacts in their own words.
(5) Audience members respond when the issue is highlighted in the local or national press, as this keeps driving and creating new interest in the issue.
(6) Finally, audience members also respond when they see their efforts are working. Therefore, participants encouraged providing feedback loops and impact measurements.
The transcript is online at ArtTribesNetwork.com. Here is a brief summary of the discussion:
Causes of issue fatigue
We briefly discussed causes of issue fatigue (also calling it compassion fatigue or psychic numbing). One reason audiences might disengage from a cause is their perception that there has either been no effective activism strategy put into place, or that there is no effective intervention or forward movement arising from activist efforts.
Another currently relevant reason is the economic crisis that affects our interests at home, which cause audience members to focus less on “distant” issues.
Similarly, issue fatigue hits audiences for causes that are large (hitting vast numbers of people) and/or “removed” from audience members’ daily lives faster than for issues to which they can relate personally or which center on one person in particular.
Keeping issue fatigue at bay
Discussion participants detailed their recommendations for keeping their audiences interested and committed. While you can’t necessarily apply the same questions and strategies to social issue media projects that have disparate or unique goals, the participants did come up with an overarching framework for most social issue media campaigns.
(1) Start with
(a) An exceptionally committed outreach team
(b) Sufficient resources to carry through your outreach and engagement plans
(c) A select, interested audience that will help you move the issue forward by engaging in activism and increase audience numbers by spreading the word, and
(d) Clear outreach goals for each audience segment.
(2) Given that issue fatigue hits when audience members feel disconnected, audience members must feel as if they belong to the movement and feel ownership over the outcome of activist efforts. Our participants talked about the importance of creating a personal, emotional connection to the cause through
(a) Visual imagery,
(b) A strong narrative that focuses on the story of one affected person (be that a witness, victim or survivor), and
(c) The opportunity to contribute through user-generated media.
(3) Social issue media campaigns built on slow, collective and continual action are most effective. The more people are exposed to the message through multiple media, the more likely they'll be to respond and/or take action. Therefore, campaigns must provide a pathway to action through creative opportunities for engagement.
It helps to engage in transmedia efforts, by continually creating and delivering new media, information, technologies and opportunities in order to maintain attention, through multiple distribution channels (traditional as well as digital and online), along with the opportunity to engage personally and collectively, in the real world.
(4) To communicate with your base, participants agreed that web 2.0 tools and social networks create an instant, global audience and deliver media and information most effectively. Digital communications tools are particularly useful for convening people virtually; sharing information, resources and referrals; getting attention; and inviting participation. In addition, you can encourage your audience to promote your message to their contacts in their own words.
(5) Audience members respond when the issue is highlighted in the local or national press, as this keeps driving and creating new interest in the issue.
(6) Finally, audience members also respond when they see their efforts are working. Therefore, participants encouraged providing feedback loops and impact measurements.
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