Recommendations for Spreading the Word about the Multi-City Challenge: Africa Open Call

The Multi-City Challenge Africa is officially underway! We want to ensure that as many people as possible have the opportunity to participate before the December 13 deadline, so we have put together a list of 15 recommendations to help cities, community organisations, and motivated changemakers more effectively reach a wider audience:

1. The 10 proposals challenge! Reach out to your direct contacts—community leaders, members of local NGOs, and public servants in complimentary government organizations—and ask them to submit a proposal in the next three days. Try to get ten proposals submitted this way for each of your challenges in the following three days.
2. Hold a press conference announcing the open call and contact local newspapers, news radio stations, and TV news programs inviting them to assist.
3. Contact professors and faculty members at local colleges and universities who teach or work in fields complimentary to the challenges your city is interested in (economics, urban planning, urban management, housing, sustainability, social work, community/ local development, business, etc.). Ask them to share the opportunity with their students.
4. Reach out to those who can spread the word—community organizations, local NGOs, government organizations, universities, TV and radio stations, journalists and newspapers, Facebook and Whatsapp groups, etc—and meet with them to secure their participation/aid. Afterwards, share with them the necessary advertising and outreach materials to make spreading the word as easy for them as possible.
5. Promote the open challenge actively on social media. Try to post at least once a day, calling for proposals, on Twitter, Facebook, or other social media platforms that you use often.
6. Be active in local Facebook or Whatsapp groups. Try to post a reminder about the open call in a different group each day.
7. Contact local or regional organizations like NGOs that send out daily or weekly newsletters and ask them to include a blurb about the open challenge.
8. Reach out to those in the industries you hope to affect. Ask them to submit proposals.
9. Reach out to professional organizations and industry associations. Ask them to amplify the open call to their membership, and provide them with the necessary advertising materials to do so.
10. If pandemic restrictions allow it: go out to the informal settlements and informal markets to spread the word about the open call. Bring flyers or other printed materials to hand out or post up.
11. Again, if pandemic restrictions allow it: go out to the informal settlements and informal markets with a mobile device to help citizens submit a proposal on the spot. Set a goal for the number of proposals you hope to get this way.
12. If your city publishes a periodic newsletter, be sure to include the open call in that newsletter. You may also want to send a special newsletter to your subscribers specifically about the open call.
13. Reach out to regional or national government organizations to amplify the open call beyond the city. You can also reach out to neighboring cities to do the same.
14. Reach out to universities to discuss incentivising students to submit proposals. For instance, you may ask professors to provide students with extra credit in their classes, if they submit a proposal.
15. After the initial press conference, reach out to local news organisations and offer to do interviews about the open call in order to amplify your outreach. Set a goal to do a certain amount of interviews each week.