Week 8 | Social Marketing

ONE OF THE BEST WAYS TO GET PEOPLE INTERESTED IN ENVIRONMENTAL CONCERNS IS TO APPLY IT TO THEIR LIVES. IF YOU CAN APPROACH AN ENVIRONMENTAL TOPIC AS A HUMAN HEALTH OR FINANCIAL PROBLEM, YOU ARE MORE LIKELY TO GET PEOPLE ENGAGED. FOR EXAMPLE, INSTEAD OF DISCUSSING CLIMATE CHANGE DIRECTLY, YOU CAN TALK ABOUT HOW MOSQUITO POPULATIONS ARE INCREASING AND MOVING FURTHER NORTH AS A RESULT OF WARMING CLIMATES. NOT ONLY ARE MOSQUITOS ANNOYING, BUT MOSQUITOS CARRY DEADLY DISEASES. PEOPLE MAY ALSO BE INTERESTED IF THE TOPIC CONFLICTS WITH THEIR HOBBIES, SUCH AS FISHING, VACATIONING, OR CONSUMING FOODS NEGATIVELY AFFECTED BY CLIMATE CHANGE. ANOTHER EFFECTIVE WAY TO SHARE INFORMATION IS TO USE VISUALS.

Requirements

Choose a topic from this semester (except for the mosquito example above) that you want to entice others to do something about

DESIGN AN INFOGRAPHIC OR OTHER VISUALIZATION (PRESENTATION, SEVERAL MEMES, ETC.) TO MOTIVATE THE LEARNER TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT YOUR CHOSEN ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUE

If you can’t think of an actionable task, you can invite communities to an information session, but I hope to see some creative ideas!

Although statistics are not necessarily going to persuade your audience, you should have at least one real statistic or fact somewhere in the project. Make sure you submit your source, though it does not have to be on your visualization (e.g. comment box with your submission). If you do include the source on your infographic, keep it short; avoid long URLs. Consider creating a small footnote citation.

• Remember: You do not have to DIRECTLY mention your problem. You can focus instead on a subset of the problem or a related problem. However, your instructor must be able to identify the sustianability connection.