This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on how to use web and mobile applications to generate and increase customer demand.

Among the many benefits ascribed to energy efficiency is the fact that it can help create jobs. Although this is often used to motivate investments in efficiency programs, verifying job creation benefits is more complicated than it might seem at first. This paper identifies some of the issues that contribute to a lack of consistency in attempts to verify efficiency-related job creation. It then proposes an analytically rigorous and tractable framework for program evaluators to use in future assessments.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on types of incentives.

Homebuyers are not only increasingly interested in high-performance homes, or homes incorporating green features, but they are also willing to pay more for them. This report finds that high-performance homes marketed with green features (such as a solar photovoltaic array or LEED certification) sell for a mean premium of 3.46 percent compared to homes without green features.

This webcast covers a report that is a comparative analysis of utility-run behavior programs, which lays the groundwork for further program development by developing a classification scheme, or taxonomy, that sorts programs into discrete categories.

This webcast explores residential behavior-based energy efficiency programs and provides data to support issues and recommendations.

Presentations from past Behavior Energy and Climate Change (BECC) Conference. BECC is the premier event focused on understanding individual and organizational behavior and decision-making related to energy usage, greenhouse gas emissions, climate change, and sustainability. Past conference presentations include various resources related to Marketing & Outreach.

A one-page template that helps program administrators visualize activities and associated timelines for their marketing efforts.

This document summarizes top takeaways shared by Better Buildings Residential Network members on Peer Exchange Calls, from tips to collaborating with utilities to cost-effective rebate models.

This Better Buildings Residential Network Partnerships Toolkit includes templates, tools, guides, and examples to help energy efficiency organizations engage in partnerships that leverage resources and strengthen their programs.

The Better Buildings Residential Network hosts a series of Peer Exchange Calls for members to discuss similar needs and challenges, and to collectively identify effective strategies and useful resources. This document provides a sample of lessons learned shared by members during Peer Exchange Calls held in fall 2014.

This webcast provides an overview of community-based social marketing and provides examples from programs that have used it.

This blog provides six tips the home performance communications professionals can use to create a new or update an existing marketing plan.

This worksheet can help you organize your ideas and methods for creating an effective evaluation plan.

The Database for Incentives and Joint Marketing Exchange (DIME) is an online, searchable tool to help manufacturers and retailers identify incentive and marketing opportunities for promoting ENERGY STAR certified products, and to enable all partners to coordinate with the appropriate contact from other partner organizations on promotional opportunities.

This summary report provides scientific results, lessons learned, and recommendations for driving energy efficiency in existing buildings on an urban scale. It includes program marketing lesson learned, such as: personal outreach and call to action events are critical marketing opportunities.

This webinar is the third (in a series of six) hosted by USDA Rural Utility Service (RUS) and focusing on the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Loan Program (EECLP). The first in a two-part series, this webinar shares best practices from the more than 40 competitively selected state and local governments who participated in the U.S. Department of Energy’s Better Buildings Neighborhood Program, including market position and business model, program design and customer experience, evaluation and data collection, marketing and outreach, financing, and contractor engagement and workforce development.

This webinar is the fourth (in a series of six) hosted by USDA Rural Utility Service (RUS) and focusing on the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Loan Program (EECLP). The second in a two-part series, this webinar shares best practices from the more than 40 competitively selected state and local governments who participated in the U.S. Department of Energy’s Better Buildings Neighborhood Program. This webinar focuses on data collection and continuous improvement, partnering with financial institutions, community-based outreach, and quality assurance of contractor work. It also features a case study from Jackson Electric Member Corporation about their audit tools, rebates and loans, tracking and reporting, and marketing and advertising strategies.

SEEA created this document to inform the planning, design and delivery of early-stage energy efficiency programs in the Southeast. This document captures general concepts essential to the successful development and implementation of robust program portfolios, as well as lessons learned from prior experience on the regional and national levels.

This guide is designed to serve as a "how-to" reference for island communities (or small, similarly sized, more isolated communities) that want to develop and implement a residential energy-efficiency and conservation program. The purpose of this guide is to help communities chart a course for successful program development based on the lessons learned during implementation and operation of RePower Bainbridge, an energy-efficiency program on Bainbridge Island, Washington.

This plan outlines a brand and marketing strategy to establish Energy Upgrade California as California's central energy management brand and motivate residential and small business energy consumers to take action to better manage their energy use through the brand's comprehensive statewide marketing, education, and outreach campaigns.

This marketing plan describes a social mobilization approach that leverages social networking, including social media, and word-of-mouth marketing to raise awareness and drive customers to program services. It provides strategies and tactics to target audiences most likely to participate, building on market research and audience segmentation to develop a message platform specifically designed to address their key motivating factors and barriers.

This paper presents obstacles to increasing lender and consumer participation in energy efficiency financing identified by a group of small to mid-size lenders, and offers recommendations to the energy efficiency community to foster growth in the market for energy efficiency financing.

This report analyzes ten categories of utility-sector energy efficiency programs that have achieved high participation among targeted customer markets. Despite issues with the nature and availability of participation data, the study draws on published data sources and interviews with program contacts and industry experts to identify many examples of programs that have achieved high participation.

There are more than 17 million multifamily households nationwide, yet they remain a significant and mostly untapped opportunity for energy efficiency gains. Many cities and states that have embraced energy retrofitting as a job creator and boon to both the environment and economy have yet to address potential savings in multifamily properties, primarily because of obstacles not faced by single family and commercial properties. This paper discusses two barriers -- a lack of information and financing -- that stand in the way of multifamily energy retrofits.

This case study discusses Denver Energy Challenge's adjustment from focusing on door-to-door outreach to an energy advisor model that allowed customers to receive one on one support throughout the home energy upgrade process.

This case study discusses Efficiency Maine's successful statewide Residential Direct Install (RDI) program that was established in 2012 to help create demand for home energy assessments and upgrades.

This blog summarizes how BetterBuildings for Michigan, a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Better Buildings Neighborhood Program partner, developed a "readiness scale" to help target communities by determining the factors that indicate whether homeowners in a particular area are really ready to commit to energy efficiency upgrades.

The test referenced in this article found that the pronoun used in a call-to-action button can make a big difference in whether people click on the button or not.

This instructional template offers instructions on how to write a press release.

Illinois Home Performance provides co-branding opportunities for participating contractors, including co-branding on program marketing materials.

The report, the second in a series of reports on smart meters, presents concrete examples of findings from behavior analytics research using data that are immediately useful and relevant, including proof-of-concept analytics techniques that can be adapted and used by others, novel discoveries that answer important policy questions, and guidelines and protocols that summarize best practices for analytics and evaluation.

This publication presents examples of the value that insights from behavior analytics can provide to programs (as well as pointing out its limitations).

Bill insert used by JEA to advertise their energy efficiency program.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on driving demand for energy efficiency by leveraging service calls and emergency repairs.

This webcast discusses the savings and cost-effectiveness of home energy reports programs.

This report presents findings from the Energy Forward Consumer Messaging Study. The purpose of this study is to assess
whether Northwest Energy Efficiency Alliance can deploy the Energy Forward mark as a platform or parent brand for all of its
initiatives.

This report is a comprehensive research study of energy efficiency in Northwest residential buildings. It includes a metering study, a single-family report, a manufactured homes report, and a multi-family report. In addition, it includes state-by-state energy use reports, as well as end-use consumption data.

Energy Trust of Oregon analyzes customer perceptions about energy efficiency.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on programs and outreach for faith-based organizations.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on ways to reach out to landlords.

This webcast discusses the background for U.S. Department of Energy’s Smart Grid Investment Grant (SGIG) consumer behavior study effort; the various utilities who are participating and what they each plan to include their respective studies; the quantitative results and qualitative lessons learned thus far from these studies; and the types of research will be undertaken by LBNL over the next several years.

This presentation provides an overview of the results and lessons learned from 41 community partners that participated in the Better Buildings Neighborhood Program. It also provides an overview of the Better Buildings Residential Program Solution Center.

Example proposal evaluation scoring sheet to rank qualifications of financial institution bidders for energy efficiency upgrade loan programs.

Tenant engagement programs encourage the people who live in a multifamily property to change their behavior in order to achieve a goal. These programs are an attractive option for owners or managers who want to improve energy efficiency. This report assesses the key features of existing programs, makes recommendations for improvements that housing providers and advocates can use immediately, and outlines a wish list for the future.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on how to identify stakeholders and map them to determine the best engagement strategy.

The State Energy Data System (SEDS) is the source of the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) comprehensive state energy statistics. EIA’s goal in maintaining SEDS is to create historical time series of energy production, consumption, prices, and expenditures by state that are defined as consistently as possible over time and across sectors for analysis and forecasting purposes.

Overview of Michigan Saves' employer outreach initiative to drive uptake of home energy upgrades.

Quick summaries of strategies various programs have used to improve the efficiency of delivering efficiency.

This database provides comprehensive information on state, federal, local, and utility incentives and policies that are in place to support renewable energy and energy efficiency.

Overview of lessons learned from EnergySmart Colorado's energy advisor model.

Research reveals a whole range of unmet housing-related desires in America -- gaps between what Americans have and what they say they need or want. The Demand Institute surveyed more than 10,000 households about their current living situation and what’s important to them in a home. The survey represents all U.S. households: renters and owners; movers and non-movers; young and old and finds that unsatisfied needs and desires cut across the entire population.

As part of the Rhode Island Energy Challenge, National Grid called on its Rhode Island residential electric and gas customers to take a pledge to “Find Your Four” as part of a statewide community initiative to encourage homeowners to find four ways to save energy at home. A participant survey revealed that Rhode Island residential customers liked hearing energy conservation/efficiency information via the Challenge; the Challenge had them thinking and acting differently; and the Challenge had customers participating more actively in energy efficiency programs. This report provides more information on the campaign’s major impact in helping National Grid accomplish important goals, including those related to portfolio savings and customer-centric program outreach and engagement.

This webcast discusses policy and planning considerations for incorporating behavior programs into efficiency portfolios.

With so much to gain, how can we optimize low-income energy efficiency programs to maximize the benefits for financially vulnerable citizens, as well as program implementers and the broader population of ratepayers? This paper shares four important lessons for engaging low-income customers based on Opower’s experience in partnering with utilities to serve the low-income population.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on using social media for long-term branding and marketing.

This radio interview highlights how the NeighborWorks program in Vermont is raising awareness of home energy efficiency measures among residents through neighbor-to-neighbor outreach.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on bringing energy efficiency programs to schools.

This article provides 10 tips home energy contractors can use to update their marketing outreach and improve their customer service.

This case study highlights a 20-unit apartment building that gained energy savings and comfort through Efficiency Maine.

This case study highlights the first project completed under Efficiency Maine's Multifamily Efficiency Program.

These outreach materials from BetterBuildings for Michigan include a photograph and quote from credible members of the Grand Valley State University (GSVU) community that served as early adopters for the program.

Collection of case studies from New Hampshire that highlight successful energy efficiency upgrades.

This case study explains how Community Power Works segmented its primary audience by focusing on owners of oil-heated homes with great results. This case study shares the program's outreach strategy and tactics for recruiting owners of oil-heated homes.

This report demonstrates the results achieved to date by the Southeast Energy Efficiency Alliance. It highlights the experiences of Consortium programs, their successes driving further investments in energy efficiency improvements, and the challenges that hindered their progress. It also details the infrastructure, resources, and opportunities that support the deployment of energy efficiency programming, and the approaches that the Consortium has found best suited to the region.

This study of Energy Upgrade California aims to: establish baseline consumer brand awareness; understand consumer associations with the brand; and understand consumer awareness of energy management and bill savings opportunities and barriers to taking action on those opportunities.

This study reviews consumer-facing energy-focused websites and their related assets to provide a comprehensive roadmap for website development to transform and optimize the Energy Upgrade California web portal to better support the program efforts facilitating consumer and small business participation.

This report is the first comparative analysis of utility-run behavior programs. It lays the groundwork for further program development by developing a classification scheme, or taxonomy, that sorts programs into discrete categories. This study counted 281 such programs, many with multiple iterations, offered by 114 energy providers and third parties between 2008 and 2013. After sorting programs by distinguishing features such as delivery channel and incentive type, the study arrived at 20 major program categories grouped in three large families: Cognition Programs, Calculus Programs, and Social Interaction Programs.

This case study discusses Energy Impact Illinois' marketing evolution from a broad outreach campaign to a Òhouse partyÓ approach that brought Chicago homeowners, neighbors, and friends together to learn about energy efficiency opportunities, while increasing demand for home energy assessments and upgrades.

This paper first details industry best practices for contest administration, including tips for developing an overall contest plan and timeline, product sponsor recruitment, building a dynamic informational website, maximizing customer participation, selecting the winning home, seamless installation management, capturing and documenting project results, conducting a high profile media open house and facilitating customer workshops that educate homeowners and strengthen trade ally relationships. This paper then presents results and key lessons learned from more than 20 contests supported with funds from local community sustainability programs, utility energy efficiency programs, and U.S. Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds between 2008 and 2012.

Philadelphia EnergyWorks helped sustain future programs by sharing marketing insights and program data with a local utility partner.

This presentation shares the results of the Austin Energy Poll, including insights on U.S. consumer opinions and attitudes toward energy efficiency, climate change, energy consumption, pricing, development, and regulation.

Over the past 30 years, program administrators have concentrated on investment behavior change -- that is getting their customers to install things like insulation and lighting systems using various behavior change tools such as marketing, education, rebates, and technical assistance to support the investment behavior change. Today, as program administrators move to expand the range of behavior change strategies in their portfolios, it is often difficult to know where to begin. The New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) began by detailing the range of behavior change strategies and identifying strategic opportunities.

This Focus Series interview discusses the semester-long, employer-assisted partnership between BetterBuildings for Michigan and Grand Valley State University (GVSU). This successful partnership involved an early adopter outreach campaign and served as a model for other program partnerships.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on the strategies and challenges of using holidays and other seasonal events to market energy assessments and upgrades.

This report provides the results of the Consortium for Energy Efficiency-sponsored 2013 ENERGY STAR Household Survey, which collects national data on consumer recognition, understanding, and purchasing influence of the ENERGY STAR label, as well as data on messaging and product purchases.

Links to residential projects completed under NYSERDA's Green Jobs-Green New York (GJGNY) program.

Links to case studies of residential projects and contractors under the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA)'s Home Performance with ENERGY STAR program.

This report highlights program and policy attributes that enable successful on-bill programs based on analysis of four program case studies.

This infographic summarizes the results of RePower Bainbridge's Final Boarding Call event, providing an effective, engaging way to share program results with partners and other stakeholders.

The Small Town Energy Program (STEP) toolkit gives a complete overview of STEP from planning to implementation. It also includes access to a wide variety of materials developed by the program, including: local asset materials, partner materials, personnel materials, program administrative materials, outreach materials, and surveys. STEP has posted these toolkit documents with the hope that it will assist other small towns and communities in building and running more energy efficiency programs.

These 16 state-specific fact sheets report on the results of the Residential Energy Consumption Survey. The fact sheets highlight: overall energy use, electricity use, and expenditures; residential consumption by end use (air conditioning, heating, appliances); main heating fuel; use of cooling equipment; housing types and year of construction; and numbers of televisions and refrigerators.

This video highlights Steve G. of River Forest, IL sharing his experience of how Energy Impact Illinois helped him improve the comfort and value of his 107 year-old home.

Energy Impact Illinois (EI2) conducted 1,600 phone surveys of mid- to high-income households. Its aim was to test program messaging and gauge attitudes toward home improvements and energy efficiency upgrades. The surveys provided a number of insights on the target audience's decision process.

The Brand Book describes the implementation of the ENERGY STAR® logo for ENERGY STAR partners that are labeling a product, new home, or building that has earned the ENERGY STAR. The Brand Book also provides information about designing a new outreach campaign and using the ENERGY STAR® logo to communicating the program's commitment to energy efficiency.

This report describes ACEEE's Deep South Ethnographic Project, which aimed to answer an overarching question: are end-users of energy in the Southeastern states interested in energy efficiency? This report includes the demographics of ACEEE's informants and responses to a set of questions about energy usage, bills, and money. The report also includes individual case studies from five different sites.

This blog post outlines basic needs for a successful marketing program: a plan; a budget; and to launch, track, evaluate, adjust, repeat.

In this video interview segment, Mary Templeton with BetterBuildings for Michigan discusses developing a readiness scale to determine if target audiences are ready to hear a program’s messages and take advantage of its offerings.

In this video interview segment, Bruce Doeuck of JEA ShopSmart in Jacksonville, Florida,  discusses the market segmentation methodology his program used to better understand its audience.

This publication summarizes some of the incentives offered by Better Buildings Neighborhood Program partners.

This presentation explains the pro forma spreadsheet used by Virginia's Local Energy Alliance Program to evaluate program impact.

This presentation describes Sacramento Utility District's program and Marketing & Outreach lessons learned.

Presentation describing San Jose Better Building program and tactics, including strategic partnerships, for reaching moderate income residents.

In this video interview segment, Mick Dalrymple of Energize Phoenix shares how the program used information about its audience to create a fun and appealing brand.

This presentation discusses how appraisers assess green building elements in their real estate estimates.

This presentation discusses how Clean Energy Durham focuses on getting neighbors to talk to neighbors about energy efficiency to drive demand.

This presentation describes JEA's program and lessons learned about designing custom messages for specific markets.

This fact sheet provides an overview of how state policymakers, utilities, and regulators can overcome barriers to deploying customer energy information and feedback strategies.

This presentation describes the Global Green New Orleans program and lessons learned about designing custom messages for specific markets.

This presentation provides lessons to ensure effective incentive structures.