General Principles

Consider Policy and Environmental Changes

photo of bike trail Policy or environmental level changes can support individual behavior change. Many social marketers get caught up in developing strategies to get individual-level behavior change without complementing those changes with policy or environmental level changes. How can you help make the behavior easier for your audience? What barriers from your formative research findings can be overcome with policy or environmental changes? Think about strategies you can use to influence the "upstream" behavior of policymakers and those responsible for the environment, if appropriate. This can help you create a more comprehensive plan.

Big Picture Alert

If you decide now that you want to incorporate policy and environmental changes in your program, but haven't conducted formative research with policymakers, business owners, etc., you may need to go back to phase 2 to gather data on these groups. Think of them as another target audience with their own behaviors to change.

Need to review? See Phase 2: How to Choose a Method.