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Anthony McLeod, BS and Rebecca H. Reeve, PhD, CHES. Child and Family Programs, Governor's Institute on Alcohol and Substance Abuse, Inc., 200 Park Office Drive Drive, Suite 200, Research Triangle Park, NC 27709, 919-990-9559, amcleod@mindspring.com
During 2003 the North Carolina Partners to Reduce Underage Drinking coalition (P-RUD) was engaged in reviewing six years of successes and restructuring to meet future challenges. While working to restructure and identify promising sustainability strategies, P-RUD continued to execute its work plan to reduce underage drinking. The Policy Partnership focused on advocacy for increased state beer taxes. This paper explores a tale of two web sites, one wildly successful (www.penniescount.org) and the other (www.rudpartners.org) yet to produce its desired outcome. Both sites were marketed to the same population, yet one was readily accepted and used. The other—built specifically to meet expressed demands by the desired users—flounders. What’s the difference? Users of Penniescount generated more than 26,000 messages to the 179 North Carolina General Assembly members advocating a beer tax policy that would help solve both the financial and public health challenges of the state. Individuals new to P-RUD used the site to add their voices to the advocacy effort. Rudpartners was designed in response to repeated calls for better communication, better access to materials and better access to information about what individual or organizational partners’ agendas. Few members of P-RUD used the site beyond downloading or ordering materials—features available on the coalition’s previous site. Designers for each site were the same, representing both business/marketing and health education/health communication expertise. This session offers perspectives on lessons learned and invites participants to critique the design of each site.
Learning Objectives: At the conclusion of the session, the participant (learner) in this session will be able to
Keywords: Communication Evaluation, Communication Technology
Related Web page: www.rudpartners.org and www.penniescount.org
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.