Overview

The origins of SeaWeb date back to 1995, when the Environment Group of the Pew Charitable Trusts agreed on the need to create a new communications-based ocean initiative to bring ocean conservation issues to life for Americans throughout the country. A few years earlier, several foundations had met to discuss the plight of the oceans and had funded preliminary research to identify the best ways to shape opinions and behaviors in an effort to protect the ocean. The research indicated that a communications initiative was necessary to change the course of ocean degradation. Pew took the next step, and in March 1995 recruited Vikki Spruill – a Senior Vice President at Ruder Finn Public Relations – to lead this new effort. Since 1999, SeaWeb has been an independent 501(c)3 organization that receives funding from a variety of foundations and other sources.

Today, SeaWeb is a communications-based nonprofit organization that uses social marketing techniques to advance ocean conservation. By raising public awareness, advancing science-based solutions and mobilizing decision-makers around ocean conservation, we are leading voices for a healthy ocean. Through all of our programs, we are motivated by three core beliefs.

• The ocean plays a critical role in our everyday life and in the future of our planet.
• The ocean affects us all and what we do affects the ocean.
• The ocean’s resources are finite and must be preserved to support human life.

The SeaWeb Strategy

In establishing SeaWeb, the goal was to provide accurate, unbiased information on ocean issues to a number of target audiences. At the time, no single, credible organization existed that presented the ocean crisis to media and others in an interrelated, consistent and systematic way. SeaWeb recognized early on that the media is the filter through which we view the world and understand issues – and that until ocean issues were “packaged” effectively for our fast-paced media environment, ocean conservation would remain a back-burner issue in the United States.

From the beginning, SeaWeb utilized a unique “gatekeeper strategy” that involved communicating directly to leaders from a number of sectors who inspire change and whose efforts result in greater protection for the ocean. Over the past 10 years, SeaWeb’s programs have combined the principles of social marketing and communications, utilizing tactics such as public opinion research, media training, messaging, public education and outreach-related activities to affect policy and change consumer behavior.

Another organizational goal was to provide a dynamic forum for information exchange on diverse ocean issues. Created before the boom in Internet technology, SeaWeb facilitated a unique “web” of information flow anchored in science and interwoven with essential strands of social and political awareness around the ocean.

The last few years have seen a tremendous increase in the quantity and quality of ocean conservation efforts throughout the country, and SeaWeb has played a central role in laying the groundwork for this expansion. While other groups were considering the creation of ocean programs, SeaWeb was conditioning the climate, setting the stage to make ocean campaigns more effective across the board. SeaWeb has accomplished this by:

• Identifying emerging ocean issues such as fisheries depletion and aquaculture
• Educating top tier press
• Training scientists to be better communicators to the media and policymakers
• Packaging new science to make it newsworthy and appealing to key media
• Convincing policymakers that their constituents care about the oceans, and
• Providing non-governmental organizations (NGOs) with scientific, public opinion and message data to support their work.

SeaWeb’s Use of Social Marketing

In its relatively short history, SeaWeb has become a leader in the ocean conservation community. This is due in large part to the way that SeaWeb uses sophisticated communications and social marketing strategies to advance ocean protection. Over the past several years, SeaWeb has utilized polling and social science techniques to set the stage for successful campaigns and affect consumer behavior.

This social marketing approach relies on strategic communications and an astute understanding of the views, preferences and behaviors of target audiences. By listening to the specific needs of audiences, an issue stance can be developed that will have a better chance of acceptance. For example, at its inception, SeaWeb conducted preliminary focus groups in U.S. coastal cities revealing that many Americans were unaware of the threats facing the ocean ecosystem. SeaWeb used the results of this poll to communicate widely via the media about the lack of information regarding the state of our ocean, and to promote the importance of a healthy ocean. SeaWeb identified a team of high-profile spokespeople (including renowned ocean explorer and conservationist Dr. Sylvia Earle), engaged top tier media, and communicated via numerous channels about the problems facing our ocean.

The Swordfish Case Study

As SeaWeb was gaining ground in the ocean conservation community, one campaign in particular stands out as a highly successful social marketing campaign. In 1998, SeaWeb and the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) founded “Give Swordfish a Break,” a campaign that advocated for recovery measures to restore populations of North Atlantic swordfish after decades of overfishing and mismanagement. This campaign marked the first large effort to mobilize chefs and consumers in support of stronger fish conservation. Over the course of the campaign, hundreds of chefs signed the “Give Swordfish a Break” pledge, while others—including the Peabody hotel chain, cruise lines, grocery stores and airlines—agreed to remove North Atlantic swordfish from their menus and dining choices. The campaign ended successfully in August 2000 when the U.S. government closed nursery areas in U.S. waters and the International Commission for the Conservation of Atlantic Tuna (ICCAT) implemented international quota restrictions. The campaign later received the prestigious Silver Anvil Award from the Public Relations Society of America for its communications and publicity success.

The Growth of SeaWeb’s Success

Through its several programs, SeaWeb today maintains contact with thousands of journalists, scientists, business leaders, NGOs and opinion leaders via the Internet, newsletters, individual meetings, group briefings and other means of communications. These leaders regularly rely on SeaWeb to inform them of new research and events relevant to the ocean, and to provide a forum for interaction.  The result is a better understanding among the various players in marine conservation, increased press coverage and a better-informed public. Additionally, these synergies aid other NGOs in communicating their materials and messages to the press, public and policy makers.  

SeaWeb’s successes in effective social marketing around ocean conservation continue to grow. In 2004, SeaWeb was named a Gold award winner for excellence in communications by the 2004 Wilmer Shield Rich Awards Program based on its work to protect the endangered beluga sturgeon and promote sources of sustainable caviar. The same year, SeaWeb was named a Bronze winner by the same award program for its campaign to promote a network of fully protected marine reserves along the U.S. Pacific coast. Also in 2004, Seaweb’s caviar program, Caviar Emptor, won a highly prestigious Silver Anvil Award from the Public Relations Society of America.

SeaWeb has also enjoyed a great deal of success with the Communication Partnership for Science and the Sea (COMPASS), a program run in partnership with the Monterey Bay Aquarium's Center for the Future of the Oceans and a group of leading marine scientists. Launched in 1999, COMPASS trains scientists to be better communicators, increasing public and media awareness around pressing ocean issues. Over the years, COMPASS has helped ensure the coverage of groundbreaking developments in marine science through top tier media outlets across the country.

For more information on SeaWeb’s program work, visit Programs. For a detailed timeline of SeaWeb’s successes over the years, see Accomplishments.