Tobacco Free Kids
Facebook Application
One day we wondered what would happen if we combined the targeting and grassroots capabilities of Grassroots Multiplier℠ with the reach and networking power of Facebook? Well, as it turns out, something wonderful.
Grassroots Enterprise designed and developed "I Am Smoke Free" - a grassroots advocacy Facebook application for our client, the Campaign for Tobacco Free Kids. This application was the first to empower Facebook users to send customized and targeted political grassroots letters to elected officials directly from the Facebook platform.
We're always looking to find new ways to spread our client's messages and calls to action. Developing this application that allows people to declare themselves and their Facebook profiles as "smoke-free" and then take action to elected officials in support of clean indoor air at the same time seemed like a no-brainer to us.
One of the most interesting things about Facebook, and other social networking applications is the way people connect and share on them. Information flows across profiles and jumps from one set of friends to another - and the recent opening of the platform to 3rd party developers (i.e. Grassroots Enterprise) has allowed these activities to be harnessed for political purposes.
The "I Am Smoke Free" application takes advantage of these social networking components of Facebook platform by sharing any grassroots actions taken through the Facebook news feed. This is a powerful way to combine both "viral" and word-of-mouth marketing approaches to spread a message within a social network.
In addition to the activity happening on Facebook, the application serves a recruitment tool as grassroots actions taken and the information collected from users and delivered by Facebook is captured and stored in the client's Grassroots Multiplier℠ account so it can be leveraged for additional email follow up or other future communications.
We feel that the trend of grassroots actions taking place on social networks is only going to grow, and this innovation shows that the correct approach can take advantage of the inherent buzz and positive aspects of this social connectivity - but also grow a sustainable resource of names and actions at the same time.
The development of this application demonstrates that political practitioners are going to have to see the Internet as more than just web sites and email lists. Using the web for grassroots outreach can no longer be a one-way street. The rise of social networks on the Internet presents tremendous opportunities for grassroots and political professionals to tap into the pre-existing (and somewhat public) connections that their friends and allies already have. However, to be successful they will need to be strategic about developing an outreach program (and the supporting technology) that produces sustainable results -- such as tangible issue target letters or new names in a database.
This is why we think our Facebook application is a model for other campaigns and organizations to emulate.
The "I Am Smoke Free" Facebook application can be found at:
http://www.facebook.com/apps/application.php?id=5939022908
Additional Screen shots can be seen at:
http://www.grassroots.com/resources/SmokeFree_screenshots.pdf
Featured Project
2006
DC Olympic Committee
GRE seized the coming of the 2006 winter Olympics to demonstrate the power of combining creativity and technology.
To advocate for voting rights for the District of Columbia, GRE drew comparison to other U.S. territories such as Puerto Rico and Guam who have their own Olympic teams, and established a DC Olympic Curling Team to make a bid for participation in the quirky sport at the Games in Turin, Italy.
