I am an American University student in a social marketing class, and as a class project, I analyzed the Calgary Commuter Challenge. Through my research I found the Commuter Challenge to be very commendable, as it has grown from a small event in one business into a major campaign with participants in cities across Canada.
Although I think the event is doing well already, I looked into various theories and concepts of social marketing that can possibly be applied to enhance the challenge at the core level of participants. The following are suggestions on new approaches to the campaign. The Commuter Challenge has successfully been able to target business in Calgary to compete and also conduct a major part of facilitating the event. This method has proven to work very well. If the campaign wants to try again to target a new part of the market aside from business, a key approach is to select a very specific target audience and conduct extensive research on the intended market. Quantitative research such as a focus group or in-depth interview is a great way to learn what motivations and barriers should be faced before orchestrating the promotion. Research such as this is likely to reveal new perspectives on what motivates people to change behavior.
I do know that as an update to this case study, research has improved in forms such as survey monkey, which is also a great way to understand the motivations of participants.
Another idea is to limit the amount of behaviors desired. A social marketing campaign attempts to keep the behavior it is asking simple and specific. The promotion for the Commuter Challenge is to walk, jog, cycle, in-line skate, take transit, telework, or carpool. Although these are all great suggestions, social marketing experts would say there are too many behaviors that the message gets lost in a jumble of excessive options.
One suggestion to changing the behavioral promotion is to select and promote only one behavior, such as carpooling. If it is possible to break the target audiences up into more defined market segmentation groups, the campaign could specifically target suburbanites to carpool. A separate campaign can motivate those who live closer to bike to work.
The primary goal of the campaign can be boiled down to the overall message to avoid commuting in a single-occupancy vehicle. This is one clear message, but would definitely need pre-testing to see if the message of what not to do is less accepted than what behaviors to do.
Although research on behalf of the Calgary Commuter Challenge reveals that a portion of participants continue their eco-friendly commuting routines after the week-long event, social marketers favor a longer campaign that will keep a behavior going for about three weeks. This estimated time is likely to change a habit for the long run. Perhaps the campaign can keep an optional extension for business interested in a three week long commuting challenge.
One thing that a campaign such as this one has absolutely right is that it is successfully changing a behavior to improve the social good of society. I think the Commuter Challenge is a fantastic campaign that is fun, easy, and popular.