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Peer-reviewed article

Volunteer recruitment and retention in online citizen science projects using marketing strategies: lessons from Season Spotter

January 11, 2017 | Media and Technology, Public Programs
Citizen science continues to grow, potentially increasing competition among projects to recruit and retain volunteers interested in participating. Using web analytics, we examined the ability of a marketing campaign to broaden project awareness, while driving engagement and retention in an online, crowdsourced project. The campaign challenged audiences to support the classification of >9,000 pairs of images. The campaign was successful due to increased engagement, but it did not increase the time participants spent classifying images. Engagement over multiple days was significantly shorter during the campaign. We provide lessons learned to improve targeted recruitment and retention of participants in online projects.

TEAM MEMBERS

  • REVISE logo
    Author
    National Ecological Observatory Network
  • Margaret Kosmala
    Author
    Harvard University
  • Rebecca Cheng
    Author
    George Mason University
  • Jonathan Brier
    Author
    University of Maryland
  • REVISE logo
    Author
    Arizona State University
  • Sandra Henderson
    Author
    National Ecological Observatory Network
  • Andrew Richardson
    Author
    Harvard University
  • Citation

    ISSN : 1824-2049
    Publication Name: Journal of Science Communication
    Volume: 16
    Number: 1
    Resource Type: Research Products
    Discipline: Climate | General STEM | Life science
    Audience: General Public | Museum/ISE Professionals | Scientists
    Environment Type: Media and Technology | Websites, Mobile Apps, and Online Media | Public Programs | Citizen Science Programs

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