Editors Note: The following is taken from a post Michael made at TubesCodeContent, a site dedicated to a course he teaches at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs.
Mike Smith led us this week with an excellent account of his experience in grass roots organizing during the Obama presidential campaign. More importantly — and if we listened well — he discussed how we might learn lessons from the campaign for future political advocacy whether that advocacy revolves around an election or the promotion of specific issues.
One of the key takeaways is to embrace potential allies and enable them to pursue their own online messaging in support of the issue at hand. This necessitates a relinquishing of top down control, and relinquishing such control is something many struggle with throughout all industries be they corporations, advocacy organizations, political campaigns or community organizers.
At issue, of course, is the actual message. What is it? How is it said and how is it presented? This is a classic case of who controls the messenger. In the parlance of the day, are there mechanisms to prevent others from going rogue? Or is that just the cost of doing business in the digital age?
The answer is not simple and the conversation about the answer is quite long. If we cut to the short of it though the answer is yes, no matter the vertical we need to give up our attempts to control every aspect of a brand or message and instead realize that we are a participant in an ever evolving conversation about it.
That the digital medium no longer allows top down control is not a new idea. However, many still struggle in their interactions with others who are engaging a message, and reinterpreting that message for their particular audience.
Our success in doing so is partly based on our ability to relinquish control while simultaneously maintaining active engagement with the interpretation of our message and the endless reinterpretation — and indeed misinterpretation — that is bound to take place.
How to actually do so will be tackled elsewhere. Let us now acknowledge it though and flag for later debate.
After Mike’s presentation we workshopped and tried to create grassroots campaigns that could affect a global issue (in this case, the climate change in Copenhagen). As we came out of that workshop and listened to what individual groups proposed, an interesting mix of online advocacy and physical world gathering was suggested.
While the offline advocacy was concrete (eg, we will hold events across the country and this is who we’ll target), online strategies remained somewhat vague. With each group’s presentation, we heard something along the lines of, “We’ll pursue social media, we’ll have a Web site.”
A Web site is all well and good, but to what end? What is this “social media” site that everyone leans towards and believes they must have?
I mentioned that these hypothetical sites do not need to include much. Some media around the advocacy is important. Updates for targeted communities are also important. But in the role playing we pursued the general consensus was that traditional in-person events still trump virtual communications in our efforts to engage audience support.
So where does that leave an organization’s Web site and, by extension, Internet strategy?
In this case, with others. That is, to hand our message over to advocates in the blogosphere and let them run with it.
This requires a number of important qualities, namely authenticity and transparency so that Bloggers will believe enough in your story to run it, promote it, and engage with it as they engage their Web audiences.
Equally important, it requires that after demonstrating your authenticity you accept that your idea and mission is “out there” for interpretation, manipulation and sometimes, unfortunately, condemnation.
The idea here is that you’ve put your idea, mission, thought or brand into the public and you will receive both feedback and backlash. This is important. This is expected. This is what you must navigate to be successful. At least, this is what you need to navigate to succeed in the online space.
All of which is a very long way to get to the video that starts this post: CarrotMobs.
Each cluster working on our climate change exercise advocated in-person and event oriented action. I suggested Carrot Mob techniques and the video above gives a good sense of what those may be, and how they could be engaged.
The point is rather simple, and the Jujutsu should be clear. Take your target’s greatest strength and turn it to your advantage.
I’m interested in hearing how you can advocate and get those you target to come on board with your message.
I’m doubly interested in whether you’re willing to pass your advocacy message along to the digital world, and then engage it as it transforms, or wanders off in directions you may not have planned for.
