People Power and Planet 4
Understanding our audience to inspire action
Greenpeace’s Planet 4 is being developed to harness the power of individual people to change the world. The audacious goal: inspire a billion acts of courage towards a sustainable, just, and peaceful planet.
So, how do we go about this?
The good news is that there are already so many inspired, motivated people who are acting to address the causes that move them. I strongly believe we should make room for all the insight and creativity they bring to the table. At the same time, I know from experience that effective websites focus on a core set of outcomes. If our overarching goal is for people to take action, we should design based on both an understanding of our audience and a clear vision of which courageous acts we think will be most impactful.
Step 1: Identify our audiences and their goals
As we think about what people can do starting from Planet 4, it’s critical that we understand who currently comes to Greenpeace sites, who we think we can get to come, and what’s motivating them.
I like the initial categorization Laura wrote about — educators, students, evangelists, and activists. It can (and will) be refined but it’s a good start at a high-level framework. I especially appreciate the emphasis on goals and orientations rather than demographics.
Next, we can start thinking about scenarios based on these archetypes. We’ve begun with a design tool called Job Stories, an alternative to personas or requirements or user stories (you can read more here). They’re based on the idea that, rather than wanting specific features, people “hire” a product to do a particular “job.” There’s a famous quote that expresses this: “People don’t want a quarter-inch drill, they want a quarter-inch hole.”
Of course, in many cases people have further goals — they want that quarter-inch hole for a reason — and it may be something intangible such as gaining social status or reducing angst. The point is that by framing design problems in terms of user goals in this way we open up space for new solutions to truly meaningful problems.
The fine folks at Intercom use a short madlib which identifies the triggering event or situation, the person’s immediate goal, and their desired outcome.
When (trigger)________ ,
I want to (goal)________
so that (outcome)________ .
For example, When a new volunteer signs up, I want to know, so that I can make them feel welcome. Note that no specific features are named and no persona is identified, although we should of course derive these from a research-based understanding of our audience.
Here are just a few of the many possible Jobs for Planet4:
When I see a provocative post online,
I want to understand the issue
so that I can comment intelligently.
When I see a problem in my community,
I want to know what I can do about it
so that I can help solve the problem.
When I see an opportunity to act,
I want to know how that act will make a difference
so that I can decide if it’s worth my time and energy.
When I take action,
I want to encourage others to join in
so that more people will take part.
When I’m in the store or researching products online,
I want to get an authoritative recommendation
so that I can choose the most socially responsible product.
And of course there are many more which we’ve started collecting in this spreadsheet. Have Job Stories to contribute — especially ones you’ve experienced yourself? Please add them!
Step 2: Identify the courageous acts we want to inspire and support
Many social change sites focus on driving donations and urging people to sign petitions. There are obviously good reasons for this: membership-based non-profits rely on donations to keep the lights on and petitions are a time-honored way to demonstrate support from large numbers of people.
But I think it’s important that we ask what other acts we might inspire. For example, people can…
Learn about issues, campaigns, and solutions.
Show support by signing petitions, updating social avatars, using hashtags.
Share stories, knowledge, petitions.
Give money.
Donate goods (e.g. offering tents to people protesting the #NoDAPL).
Make consumer decisions such as boycotting do-bad companies, greening their homes, purchasing ethical products.
Write articles, posts, tweets.
Attend offline events such as workshops, debates, trainings.
Attend online events such as Q&A sessions or campaign briefings.
Participate in protests such as demonstrations, marches, sticker campaigns.
Join local volunteer groups.
Organize meetings or actions.
Call politicians.
Start their own petitions.
Work online for crowdsourcing and citizen science projects.
Welcome new volunteers and help them engage.
And lots more! Please share your ideas in the comments below or using #gpp4.
I believe we can (and should) make space for all these actions and also develop a clear focus on the subset we most want to inspire and facilitate.
What’s next?
None of this matters if it doesn’t help us make design decisions. Even before moving into the generative phases of the project, I’d like to use these tools—along with additional research—to evolve our understanding of our users and how well we’re currently meeting their needs: Which actions seem to match specific audience motivations? Which Jobs seem to be well met by current features and content? Where are the gaps and opportunities?
I can’t wait to see how this evolves as we move towards the concept phase of the project.
As always, please feel free to reach out or comment with suggestions, questions, or any other thoughts on content or process. And there are plenty more ways to get involved on this wiki page.
