Websites that Encourage Engagement

Hi Tom,

If you wants a social network, check out Ning (www.ning.com). It's been used by a few sustainability groups such as:

http://sustainableenterprise.ning.com/
http://clevelandsummit.ning.com/

The trick with these things is maintenance - a much bigger investment than most people realise. There's no point developing anything if there's not someone responsible for keeping it active over time.

The other major consideration is simplicity. Online infrastructure is great, but people will always be limited in their willingness to use it.

Also, I attended a Sustainability Accord workshop in early August this year and one key topic that came up was investigating Web 2.0 Collaboration tools. I have the details of the councils involved - if you want their details please email me at [email protected] and I'll send to you (would rather not post other people's contact details without their permission!)

Good luck.

Alexi Lynch
Project Manager
Ironbark Sustainability
Australia
www.ironbarksustainability.com.au

Hello Tom,

We publish websites that do this in the area of waste minimization and diversion. I describe them as a combination of Craigslist for Recycling (actually reuse, but I have to speak in terms people understand) and Earth 911. From our experience dating back to 2003, our websites are really busy and being used constantly in Grays Harbor County, WA and Madison WI (as 2 examples) when 1. they offer a useful service 2. when content changes 3. when design and functionality is good 4. when the site can keep up to the internet and not fall behind the standards people currently expect 5. when a local group markets and promotes them well 6. when critical mass is achieved in terms of membership, visitation and traffic.

We start from the point of offerring a useful service from the point of view of the potential user. That's the most important part.

See www.2good2toss.com and www.madisonstuffexchange.com

Those services listed above are directed to the public. We have another site in Syracuse, NY used by a non-profit foundation to network and coordinate activities of groups that it works with. It's a combination of a Craigslit for non-profits, including events and calendar, including trading services, and with directories and guides etc on the site. The site owners have done a great job working with the groups they coordinate. See www.giffordslist.org

Norm Ruttan
President
iWasteNot Systems
Canada
www.iwastenotsystems.com

Hi Tom.

For what you're doing, I'd take a social marketing approach, to online social marketing. That means starting with an audience study, getting feedback from them, figuring out what you want to do, then at that point, looking at technology that can help and doing a proper assessment of solution options.

In regards to how you frame your engagement strategy, I spent about 1.5 years studying the design of health behavioural change websites that could be used for social marketing campaigns. I've posted a pre-publication edition of my upcoming paper, and you may find the part on the psychological architectures of behaviour change websites, offers some ideas on how you could approach designing the site.

http://cugelman.com/images/stories/_documents/Cugelman 2010 meta-analysis_PRE-PUBLICATION-VERSION.pdf


Good luck.

Brian

--------------------------
Brian Cugelman, PhD
Managing Director, AlterSpark
 

Hi Tom,

I work for Futerra in London in an internal engagement/behaviour change capacity. I specialise in creating networks of environmental Champions internally so the websites that I can think of are all on company's intranets.

However, in my experience, you need to think about the different 'pull factors' for different parts of your audience (have a look at the Values Modes at http://www.cultdyn.co.uk/ for more info). I suspect the main users of your site initially will value the project management/networking functionality (and will be what we call inner directed 'pioneers'). But also have a think about how you attract others. Status driven 'prospectors' will value social networking functions such as profiles and 'settlers' will probably need to see others from their local communities on there in order to use the site.

I've got other ideas around crowdsourcing of ideas that I could share with you. Drop me a line at harrietkingaby at futerra.co.uk if you would like to chat further.

Interesting sites:

Look at the way Kelloggs (and their different products) use Facebook
http://www.myoocreate.com/
See our 'Rules of the Game' at www.futerra.co.uk

Harriet Kingaby
United Kingdom

Thanks to everyone that has commented.

At the moment I am working on developing a project brief that will incorporate many of your suggestions

Regards

Tom Walsh
Environmental Education Officer
Bayside City Council
Australia

Hi again Tom,

In reviewing the comments made, the only thing I would add is that citizens like to learn, but they really want to 'do' something concrete to make a difference. So education leading to understanding, leading to action is way better than education leading to understanding. Understanding without being able to act to improve the situation leads to frustration, or apathy.

Norm Ruttan
President
iWasteNot Systems
Canada
www.iwastenotsystems.com