This toolkit describes how to strengthen residential energy efficiency program outreach and marketing efforts through data-driven, tailored efforts to change behaviors. One of the greatest challenges facing the residential energy efficiency market is motivating people to take steps to save energy. This toolkit provides guidance, resources, and examples for applying community-based social marketing (CBSM) to increase the number of homes that are energy efficient.

This report, informed by leading research and real-world examples, highlights practical online and in-person tactics that contractors can use to promote social interaction and social comparison among homeowners to make energy upgrades a "must-have" in U.S. homes.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on the advantages and challenges of data tracking systems.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on evaluating and demonstrating the cost-effectiveness of energy upgrades to programs.

Fact sheet that provides an overview of the Energy Impact Illinois Loan Program.

This packet contains all the contractor reporting and verification forms required by Energy Impact Illinois.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on how programs use behavior change strategies to reduce energy use.

This summary from a Better Buildings Residential Network peer exchange call focused on quality assurance and control, standardization of upgrades and workforce expectations.

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

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

This peer exchange call summary focused on using approved contractor lists and matching customers with contractors based on processes/criteria.

Matrix of participating lenders and associated loan information.

Flyer for contractors that explains the EI2 loan program and loan eligibility criteria.

Flyer for contractors that explains the steps needed to complete the EI2 loan process.

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.

The objective of this document is to help state and local governments understand the role of program administrators (PAs) and assist them in developing successful partnerships with utility and other energy efficiency PAs. The majority of this paper presents information on partnering and leveraging current energy efficiency activities. However, it also includes information for governments in areas without active PAs, as well as an appendix with a case study describing how state and local governments can fill gaps and administer programs in the absence of a PA.

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.

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

Three-part webinar series. Part I discusses how to design and implement funding programs, line up partners, and gain support for clean energy programs through both conventional and non-conventional methods. Part II discusses how to locate available sources of funding. Part III explains how to leverage existing funds and make clean energy investments more affordable for clean energy program audiences.

Presentation that provides an overview of the Energy Savers Program (Illinois), including services, benefits, and success stories.

A list of tips from Connecticut's Neighbor to Neighbor Energy Challenge for working with utilities to access energy usage data.

This practitioner-focused Toolkit for Residential Energy Efficiency Upgrade Programs was created by Green For All to assist new, established, and future energy efficiency programs launch and scale initiatives that can deliver the full promise of the green economy. It is intended as a practical resource that offers examples, tools, and templates that a program manager can deploy to implement a variety of aspects of their program including best practice briefs and summary documents, RFPs, contracts, and other program design and implementation templates that communities nationwide have used to create their own efficiency programs.

This document provides an overview for incorporating workforce development principles into projects.

This presentation describes Connecticut Neighbor to Neighbor Energy Challenge program and lessons learned on community engagement as a driver of demand.

This webcast (Part I of a three-part series) covers the big picture questions that local governments should consider for funding clean energy programs. What resources are available? What are the program priorities? How can these programs pay for themselves? What funding is available? The webinar guides local governments through these and other questions in the context of their own unique circumstances and illustrates the concepts through case studies that explore how local governments have used both conventional and unconventional methods to gain support, line up partners, and design and implement their funding programs.

This report from Climate Solutions analyzes small- to medium-sized American cities that are using successful methods to further clean energy economic development. Better Buildings Neighborhood Program partners that are featured in the report include Bainbridge Island and Bremerton, Washington; Boulder, Colorado; Bedford, New York; Madison, Wisconsin; and Grand Rapids, Michigan. The report includes details on the how the featured cities funded their projects, found successful models to reach their goals, and to see which new projects are off to a promising start.

This peer exchange call summary focused on effective program evaluation and incorporating changes into programs based off evaluation insight.

This fact sheet provides promising approaches for Better Buildings programs seeking to accelerate workforce development to support building energy upgrades. These approaches are organized by estimated level of effort and include rough estimates of cost ranges for implementation.

Connecticut's Neighbor to Neighbor Energy Challenge's perspective on their partnership with Northeast Utilities.

Presentation that focuses on grantee program-utility partnership models.

This peer exchange call summary focused on activities to streamline service delivery to customers.

Connecticut's Neighbor to Neighbor Energy Challenge uses dashboards that display key project data for administrators and contractors to monitor progress over time. The program has evaluated performance at different steps in the process and identified strategies to improve performance where needed, such as sales training for contractors, energy advisors, monthly contractor scorecards, and multiple customer "touches." These improvements increased the close rate from 26 to 60 percent in one year.

This peer exchange call summary focused on leveraging effective partnerships for multi-family and low-income outreach and service delivery.

This peer exchange call summary focused on strategies, challenges and opportunities in working with condominium owners and associations.

This peer exchange call summary focused on the strategies, challenges and key interaction points with the real estate sector.

This presentation includes the brands, website addresses, and images for most of the Better Buildings Neighborhood Program partners.

This presentation provides the results of a 1,600-person survey of mid- to high-income households conducted by Energy Impact Illinois (EI2) to gauge attitudes toward home improvements and energy efficiency upgrades.

This presentation shares how the Neighbor to Neighbor Energy Challenge collected and evaluated data and used the results to improve its program.

Authorization form to obtain household energy information.

This template, used by Connecticut Neighbor to Neighbor Energy Challenge, standardizes volunteer data collection efforts at events.

Short survey for Connecticut's Neighbor to Neighbor Energy Challenge workshop participants. The workshop allowed the program to share its energy efficiency offerings with homeowners.

This webcast provides guidance about the financial stakeholder engagement process and offers lessons from the field.

Survey for consultants participating in Green Madison and Me2 programs about their experiences with the programs.

Experimental design is often used to increase certainty about the actual impacts of a program and what strategies are worth repeating going forward. This webcast reviewed some experimental design techniques and gave examples of how they might fit into your programs.

Example Me2 and Green Madison process evaluation plan to conduct an in-depth investigation and assessment of the major program areas.

Survey for people who signed up to participate in the Me2 program for home performance assessments, but ultimately decided not to participate. The goal of the survey is to help improve services for future participants.

Participant survey sent to Me2 customers that have completed at least the initial Energy Advocate visit.

These award winning videos show the benefits of residential energy efficiency.

An overview of tools and approaches used to transform the energy efficiency market in Chicago.

The Connecticut Neighbor to Neighbor Energy Challenge developed this form for authorization to obtain household energy information.

Webcast on how to design a community energy alliance.

This presentation outlines the steps Connecticut's Neighbor to Neighbor Energy Challenge program took to obtain and sort useful feedback from surveys and volunteer observations.

This presentation summarizes the market research that was performed by various Better Buildings Neighborhood Program partners.

This sample RFP from Chicago can be used as an example when developing a communications strategy.