Making a pledge
You would like to make a pledge, this is brilliant news! This article will show you you the way.
By the end of this article you'll be able to:
✓ Find and choose a Do Action to pledge
✓ Personalise and make your pledge
✓ Know how to stick to a pledge
How to make a pledge
- Firstly, get the URL or name of the campaign you're supporting from your organisation or campaign owner.
- If you don't have a URL, search for the campaign or company name in the search box
- Log in or sign up. This video shows you how.
Choosing a Do Action to pledge
✓ Choose from over 60 Do Actions; there's something for everyone!✓ Filter by food, travel, home, lifestyle or work.✓ Sort by highest impact, lowest effort or most popular.
When you click on your chosen Do Action you can:
✓ Personalise it to make it relevant and achievable to you✓ See how much carbon you'll save as your personalise it.
We love big dreams and high hopes, though the key to behaviour change success is to be realistic and set achievable goals. You can aim increasingly higher each time you make a new pledge.
Sticking to a pledge
So here's the thing; behaviour change can be surprisingly easy if you know what works. We've been doing this for 10 years, so we'll share our three top tips with you:
1. Make it achievable. If you've never sewed anything before, you're unlikely to fix a new zip to your old jeans on the first attempt, without any hiccups. All the cliches are true: Rome wasn't built in a day, Cathedrals are made using many bricks, baby steps.
2. Change your environment. What can you change to make it easier to remember your new habit and stick to it?
For example, if you're the type who loses keys, having a hook in a visibly unavoidable place just inside the house helps you lose them less.
- If you are trying to eat less meat, buy less meat; go to a greengrocers to get your shopping or go to a veggie-only cafe so won't be tempted.
- If you want to cycle more, ask a partner or flatmate to hide your rail pass or car keys (we recommend choosing a trusted friend for this one) and make sure you have the right clothes so a bit of rain or cold doesn't make or break it for you.
- Turning the heat down on your boiler so your water doesn't get too hot, is easier than moderating the water temperature in the shower each day.
We'll email you practical tips like this throughout your pledge period, and you can find advice in the 'how' section of each Do Action page.
3. Be part of a community. Making your commitment public keeps you true; your pledge appears on the campaign page you're pledging to, and you can share your pledge socially too. Being held accountable helps. And knowing other people around you are striving to make similar changes. There are tweets at the bottom of every Do Action page which you can share. Tag @the_donation to your vegan meals, bike pics, solar panels, reusable water bottles and the rest! on instagram, facebook and twitter.
We hope this gets you off to the best possible start! We'll send you a couple of emails tips for your pledge during the 2 month pledge period, and at the end we'll ask you to confirm how you got on.
Best of luck and let us know how it goes!