The other week Patrick Olszowski, Senior Campaigns and Policy Officer at Mencap came to speak about ecampaigning to participants on NCVO’s Certificate in Campaigning he was fantastic and very kindly offered us his 10 top tips on e-campaigning and here they are…..  

1) What wins campaigns online is not technology but power, applied at the correct time, against the correct target, by the correct (and sometimes  incorrect) people.  Offline it is no different.
2) Campaigning is like judo - where possible try and use an opponent's own body weight against themselves - Greenpeace Green my Apple campaign is a good example (which used Apple's own branding on a spoof website to persuade Apple to stop using toxic chemicals in theircomputers)

  

3)At the heart of ecampaigning is story telling.  If you have the swankiest website and poorest story, you will never change anything Ideas are dangerous and that is why these are always your main arsenal. So before you even start thinking about technology, think

Message, Audience, Timescale, (Is this the correct) Tactic, (Is it)engaging, Recycle (use other ideas you already like), AnalySe (evaluate and split test all your work)  

4) If you don't buy your own Theory of change, then others won't either - you need a compelling narrative about how taking action now will lead to real world change - http://www.grantcraft.org/index.cfm?pageId=808
5) You need to use ecampaigning in an intelligent way to both persuade bosses and to win campaigns - winning the internal battle can sometimes be the hardest thing.
6) Know what you are getting into - Greenpeace's excellent campaign on rainforest deforestation vs Nestle is an example of a campaign against a corporate which shows how poorly used ecampaigning can be a real damage to your brand - http://www.greenpeace.org/international/campaigns/climate-change/kitkat/ 

7) Think about how you can use maps, pictures or audio to tell a story - not just text.  www.standupfortinylives.org/map/ or http://www.mencap.org.uk/page.asp?id=14849 
8) With a compelling ask and a tight deadline you can raise lots of money - along the lines of this Open Rights Group and 38 Degrees action which raised £25k in three days to fund adverts against the Digital Economy Act -

  
9) Great online campaigning can come from members of the public as well as professionals campaigners - http://www.mencap.org.uk/news.asp?id=13834 - and can marry online and real world campaigning.
10) To move forward think of your story, analyse where power lies, persuade your internal stakeholders and then and only then ecampaign!

Big big thank you to Patrick, if you have any other tips or if people want to elaborate on these please do.