Background: How We Developed this Material

Project Background

When it comes to climate change mitigation and adaptation planning, getting to implementation can be the hardest part. But it's only one step on the path to climate action.

Success can be hampered if we forget to plan for (and save resources for) a key component of action: getting the word out to engage stakeholders on plans and progress.

Clean Foundation teamed up with R&G Strategic to help support rural municipalities across Nova Scotia in implementing programs and projects that propel climate action on a regional and municipal level, and across multiple units and topics.

R&G, Clean's strategic communications partner, helped create this knowledge resource base for municipalities.

Our goals for the project:

Help municipalities focus, delegate, and manage their communications efforts with resources and tools.
Establish a range of guidance that does not take a one-sized-fits-all approach.
Ensure this knowledge base understands the biggest communications challenges facing rural Nova Scotian communities, so we can apply strategic thinking and efforts to match.
Offer deeper resources for those with bandwidth to go further.

During the Project:

We conducted one-on-ones with all the municipalities within the Clean Climate Municipal Action project to uncover what constraints or pain-points they might face in conducting successful outreach campaigns, as well as to understand the biggest factors in their communications wins around similar programs to date.

Outcomes:

You can view our insights here:

The key takeaways from our sessions with rural communities which we have focused on in this knowledge base were as follows:

Communities do not struggle with marketing and communications channels or tactics. Often communities have a standard routine that works in this regard, and it fits within their budget plans. Communities' needs centred around connecting messaging to specific constituent types. In order to make the greatest impact, we chose to focus this supplementary material on the persona types you might find in rural Nova Scotia, and to connect specific issues and motivators for each audience.
Some councillors will position themselves in opposition to municipal planners' implementation plans rather than as supporters—where this issue is critical to society and the environment, we wanted to include material on how to turn your councillors into champions.
Communities indicated that actual communications and marketing campaign examples were only valuable if they can demonstrate success. We've included case studies for particular persona groups, and narrow campaign examples focused on message success rather than tactical success, to help illustrate the potential.
Carbon is hard to illustrate—it's easier to help folks understand GHGs when they can imagine equivalents that resonate. We've created a carbon equivalents calculator based on Nova Scotian data.

We plan to continue adding to this knowledge base!

Project Background

What's Next