Collaborating for Community: 3 Steps to Effective Utility Outreach
What’s the best bang-for-your-buck when engaging with rural communities? Especially when your service area is spread out?
How locally controlled utilities can maximize impact
Engaging communities in rural and sparsely populated areas can be challenging for utility communicators. Public and consumer-owned utilities, which often serve these areas, have a deep commitment to providing essential services regardless of geography. To maximize impact and create meaningful connections, strategies must be tailored to the specific characteristics of these communities and the goals of the utility. Here’s how you can do that in three steps.
1) Identify Potential Partners
Collaboration is key to making a significant impact. The best way to spread a message or drive action is by involving diverse groups and third parties. It’s important to look beyond the obvious community leaders and think creatively about your community’s unique institutions and popular places—these are your vehicles for engagement.
Think of businesses, locations, or groups that people regularly frequent. The obvious ones are schools, churches, community centers, libraries, and county fairs, but really think about your specific community. Where do people consistently gather willingly, and which entities do they trust?
For example, in a rural community where my family lives, there’s a local thrift shop that provides a certain discount on Wednesdays. Going to this thrift shop on a Wednesday is an event for many community members.
It’s a known entity, a known promotion, and a trusted and reliable institution with a following. Because of those characteristics, I would put this thrift shop on my list of potential partners or collaborators.
Places that are known, trusted, and valued by the community, are ideal collaborators for engagement efforts.
2) Establish Your Goals
Before you can effectively engage your community, you need to define your goals. Ask yourself: Are you spreading awareness about consumer programs? Seeking buy-in for an upcoming project? Educating the community about efficiency measures to reduce their bills?
Knowing what you want to achieve is critical.
For instance, if I work for an electric consumer-owned utility and winter is approaching, I know that high bills are coming. My goal could be to educate consumers about why bills increase during the winter and what they can do to manage usage before it’s too late.
Setting clear goals helps focus your outreach.
3) Find Common Ground & Reach Out
With a list of potential partners and goals in mind, the next step is to identify shared interests. (It just so happens that the examples I listed work perfectly together—I love when that happens!) For example, if my utility and the local thrift shop both exist not for profit but to serve the community, I can approach them with that common ground. To make the partnership work, I need to consider what’s in it for the thrift shop—perhaps they want to increase traffic on slower days.
We might decide that the utility will donate LED light bulbs to the shop for a giveaway on a certain day, and we’ll cross-promote the giveaway with short videos and social posts that highlight energy-saving tips and tie into the shop’s products, like blankets or blackout curtains. Cross-promoting this initiative across channels, we could reach more community members and help them save money during the winter.
Locally owned utilities serving rural areas must adapt their outreach to suit their communities’ unique needs. By identifying the right partners, setting clear goals, and finding common ground, utilities can build trust and foster lasting relationships. Success in rural engagement isn’t just about efficiency; it’s about delivering value to the heart of the communities they serve.
