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Today:
Millions online
Tomorrow:
Billions online
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Information wants to be free.
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Volume 2, Number 3 April 10, 2002
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Creating the "Go To" Site: Keeping the Content Fresh With a Discussion
Forum
One of the most daunting challenges when managing an issue
advocacy Web site is to keep the content fresh and timely. To achieve long-term
success, these sites must be positioned as a "go to" resource for
lawmakers, news media, and citizens concerned about the issue at hand. No matter
how impressed these audiences may be with the site upon their first visit, if
they fail to find new and compelling content on subsequent visits, they will
stop using it. This results in the lost opportunity to affect the debate, as
the Web site will cease to be a factor in shaping the language and tone of how
people talk about the issue. One way to keep the content on your site fresh
and timely without creating an overwhelming burden for your issue managers and
Web master is to create a forum for your audience to post and exchange ideas.
Using community building tools, such as a message board or discussion
forum, on an issue advocacy Web site can dramatically increase the utility of
the site. For example, including an issue-focused message board on an advocacy
site allows visitors to post questions and observations. These postings spur
responses by other site visitors. By monitoring and occasionally participating
in the forum, the issue manager responsible for maintaining this forum can collect
valuable issue information from the postings, answer questions, and respond
to misstatements and criticisms. Used this way, the forum becomes a very versatile
and powerful issue management tool that simultaneously keeps the content on
the site fresh and worth revisiting time and time again.
These issue forums should be used strategically. For example,
a forum placed in the public section of a Web site will yield benefits and require
management that differs from a forum placed behind a member's only password.
These differences are due to distinct characteristics of the audiences. The
audience for the public section of the site will include lawmakers, news media,
activists, and concerned citizens. This audience will not always be supportive
of your policy goals. While it is possible, and generally advisable, to monitor
and edit the discussion to assure civility, rather than delete critical postings,
it is often more persuasive to answer to them with clear, compelling and well-evidenced
responses. The more honest this discussion, the more likely lawmakers and the
media will observe and participate in it. Remember, since this forum is hosted
on your issue advocacy site, the discussion is always framed by text and links
to materials that support your policy agenda. This gives you the "home
field advantage," and thus insulates you, to a great extent, from the negative
comments.
If the forum is placed behind a password, then the audience is
more likely to be pure supporters, such as members of an association. At the
same time, such discussions will be inaccessible to lawmakers, news media, and
concerned citizens, so the impact of these discussions on general Web site traffic
and the tone of the policy debate will be minimized. Such forums are useful
for developing internal strategy and for gathering sensitive intelligence. That
being said, it is sometimes advisable to provide password access to specific
targeted audiences, like lawmakers and news media, to these protected forums…or
to a forum specifically created for them. This serves to expose these decision-makers
and opinion leaders to the discussion and your perspectives, while providing
them with a special incentive to use your site to learn about the policy issue.
While there are many ways to keep the content on an issue site
fresh and timely, community forums are among the easiest. They provide so many
advantages-intelligence gathering, community building, fresh and timely content;
encourage return visits, etc.-that the disadvantages are often easily outweighed.
Online Advocacy Tips:
Creating the "Go To" Site: Community Produced Content
1. Keep content on issue advocacy site fresh and timely by providing forums
for audience contributions
2. Create public forums for lawmakers, news media and concerned citizens
3. Create private forums for special audiences (members, invited lawmakers,
invited new media, etc.)
4. Allow both sides to post comments (with editing, for civility)
5. Issue manager monitors and participates in forum to keep discussion focused
on your agenda
6. Frame forum with text and links highlighting your policy agenda
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