The Challenge
Create nationwide support among key political “Influentials” for a widely-used fuel that produces electricity and create an effective standing “Army” of citizen advocates to engage public policy makers.
Strategy
Create and manage a multi-year coordinated campaign to foster development of a national grassroots and GrassTops network of voters and community leaders willing to be active advocates on a variety of federal, state and local issues.
Tactics
- Recruit, educate and engage a standing Army of 250,000 advocates, including 35,000 local elected officials.
- Aggressively integrate online tools, including customized integrated advocacy database, Letter-to-the-Editor and “Contact Your Legislator” tools; social media tools; and text messaging.
- Activate the Army as needed at the federal, state, and local levels in support of initiatives by calling, writing, e-mailing, and/or meeting with public officials.
- Recruit advocates to testify and/or submit comments at state and federal regulatory and legislative hearings.
- Generate and place Op-Eds, Letters-to-the-Editor, and comments on news sites and blogs.
- Create and manage local events.
- Create and manage state-wide issue-based “political” campaigns.
- Identify and recruit high-level local political activists to communicate with public officials on specific issues.
Results
- Over 200,000 citizen advocacy contacts with public officials from voters and local elected officials
- Sustained growth of the Army over 10 years, with an average retention rate of 80%
- Moved the needle on public opinion during the field program in the 2008 campaign, increasing public support by 26 points and cutting opposition in half
- Pushed the issue into the political discussion during presidential campaign and moved from no mentions by candidates to making our issue a topic in each of the presidential debates with all major candidates voicing support in the debates and on the campaign trail
