About us
And
about you
Everybody wants to change the world. But more people have a fond wish than a real strategy. Experience suggests that defining your issue properly and targeting the message to the decisive audience can overcome resistance, move key segments of opinion, shift the power balance, and change things on purpose.
This site passes along a few things we've learned about using media channels not for self-expression, not as echo chambers, but as practical, efficient tools to win power over events.
If these basic ideas make sense to you, use them. They aren't secrets. These techniques create headlines every day, across the political spectrum.
To start, ask these five questions:
[ 1 ]
WHAT WILL WINNING LOOK LIKE?
Make vivid the benefits
change will bring.
[ 2 ]
WHO HAS THE POWER TO DECIDE?
City council?
A corporate CEO?
[ 3 ]
HOW CAN
WE REACH THEM?
What channel is the best match for the message?
[ 4 ]
HOW DO WE CHANGE THE CALCULUS?
What makes change the
most attractive outcome?
[ 5 ]
HOW DO
WE STEER STRATEGY?
How do we stay out
front of our opponents?
Who's behind it
Jonathan Polansky has played research, strategic and creative roles in some 200 print, broadcast and online advocacy campaigns in a dozen countries on issues ranging from wilderness preservation and climate change to domestic violence, reproductive rights, gun safety, food marketing and tobacco control.
He was creative director of San Francisco's Public Media Center for twenty-five years before starting Onbeyond LLC in 2004. Since then, among other projects, he collaborated with Truth Initiative, the CDC and the World Health Organization in UCSF's Smokefree Media campaign — slashing kids' exposure to rampant tobacco promotion in PG and PG-13 movies by 90 percent.
Advocacy campaign funders over the years have included the California Wellness Foundation, The Ford Foundation, Richard & Rhoda Goldman Fund, Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, Levi Strauss Foundation, Pacifica Foundation, The Pew Charitable Trusts, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Turner Foundation.
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