Further Information: Northamptonshire Impact Awards Inclusion Month.doc
Throughout 2016, Northamptonshire Sport made a decision to give each month a theme to support a particular work area or series of projects.
It was decided that September would be a great opportunity to hold an “Inclusion month” alongside the Paralympics and the Disability officer and Marcomms Officer put a plan in place to maximise the opportunity to raise the profile of Inclusive sport.
The main Objectives were:
- Profile disabled athletes from all over the county and promote the message that there are plenty of opportunities for local disabled people to get involved as participants, coaches or volunteers
- Support our Northamptonshire talented athletes representing GB at the Paralympics
- Raise the Profile of Paralympic events and how to access those opportunities locally
What we did
In preparation for Inclusion month, our Disability Officer, Graeme Wilson, ultilised his extensive knowledge to gain a list of different profiles from athletes and coaches. The Marcomms lead then put these profiles together so that every week day throughout September, a different person and sport was profiled on our Social media pages. A couple of examples of these are shown below including the now very well know Ellie Robinson as well as local sportsmen, the Lazenby brothers.
Graeme also wanted to give profile to Paralympic sports, the rules, how to play them and where to access them locally. Most week days Graeme posted an article on the website about a different Paralympic sport. This was also published on our social media pages.
During the month of September, our website and social media data was higher than during any other month of the year. There were around 1500 more users on our website than average, 2-3000 more user sessions, a higher than average new visitor percentage, most referrals to our website were from facebook and 10,000 more page views that our second most successful month.
Graeme had been involved in the talent ID programme which helped to identify para Swimmer Ellie Robinson and as she progressed during the Paralympics and won her first Gold medal at 15 years old, with her then trademark gangster entrance, we decided to create a video of support for her next race.
We mocked up a swim race where swimmers entered wheating big hoodies, “gangster” style. We tweeted the video to “The Last Leg” and managed to get recognised on the show that night with a live clip of our video. The tweet with the video alone had over 350 engagements.
In addition to the stats that show just what a phenomenal impact our Inclusion month had on the way in which our ustomers interacted with us, telephone and email queries also increased during the month
Results
- Much increased social media interaction and engagement
- Feature on national TV – The Last Leg
- Increased exposure and profile of “everyday” local disabled athletes, coaches and volunteers
- 2 local TV interviews and 2 local radio interviews
- New Learning Disability Running Group on local TV led by the Lazenby twins who have gone on to inspire others
- Profile led to a feature on the BBC’s “Inside Out”
- A number of Inclusive courses ran during September for those with Disabilities or those who are working with those with disabilities