OBESSU at the European Campaign Lab
The Dandelion Group organised its first European Campaign Lab in Brussels and OBESSU was there! During three days, we got insights from 6 different professionals, working for organisations like WWF or Crisis Action, on different aspects that are needed to craft a successful campaign.
The Lab applied both, theory and practice, and we were able to not only learn from the experts but also to practice and get feedback on our ideas. We started with crafting a theory of change and focused on the impact we want to have and changes we want to make, which are what a successful campaign needs.
Once we knew what we want to accomplish, we mapped our stakeholders and looked at how to create successful and powerful coalitions. You need to know who your target group is, who your messages should get to, and how to get your message out in the most effective, understandable way. Considering that everyone’s social media is full of information, the way you communicate your campaign and the messages you choose can make or break a campaign.
How to fund your campaign was another question we tried to answer. Apart from the EU funds which are often the obvious answer, we got an insight into individual contributions, partnerships with private companies and other alternative sources. Since there are many social media campaigns these days, we had a session on creative communications. We learned how to make a campaign visually appealing and understandable and we took time to make a campaign social media strategy. A session on digital campaigning taught us how to be digitally disruptive and how to create an effective user journey.
During the three days of the Lab, we managed to go through the most important aspects of a successful campaign and we are looking forward to using what we have learnt in practice – both in our campaigns but also by sharing the knowledge with our membership.
We are happy to have been able to participate in the Lab and we will share the knowledge with our members through the Stronger School Student Unions. If you are OBESSU’s member, candidate or affiliate organisation and you are interested to learn more about campaigns or about any other objectives of Stronger (follow the link above), please contact dasa@obessu.org.
