The launch of the Natural Hazards Research Australia website this month is a further step in outreach plans for the remainder of 2022.
As the Centre works through a million and one steps in its Year One establishment phase, it has been central in our planning to build the tools that support and promote the growing work of the Centre.
Our Strategic Plan 2021—2031, the soon-to-be-published National Research Priorities, and the work underway with setting up new research projects and enlisting partners, are all being supported by the communications team.
Once we settled on how to brand the Centre with colour, language and style, we then began to roll out our branding across all our channels and communications products.
Our brand-new website – www.naturalhazards.com.au – is the central source of information on the Centre – its research, its people, its activities, its goals.
It allows quick access to the Centre’s postgraduate and early career researcher programs, upcoming collaboration opportunities and events, the latest natural hazards research news, information about the Centre’s Board, committees and staff, plus a space for prospective partners to learn about how to get involved with the Centre to commission new science.
The development of the website was completed over several months with digital agency Webplace.
The website will be continually refined over the next few months with more collaborative integrations to come, as well the addition of industry-ready tools. It will also be better integrated with 18 years of research outputs from the Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC and preceding Bushfire CRC.
Our monthly newsletter is emailed to our mailing list with all the essential updates on how the Centre is progressing and how to get involved, drawn from the News page on our new website. Sign up and encourage your colleagues to sign up.
Social media channels are a good way for us to get the information out quickly and broadly, with most posts linking back to important information on the website. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube. The CRC’s social media channels are no longer being updated, so be sure to switch over to our new channels.
Events are being planned, including conferences, workshops, webinars and other forums for knowledge translation. We are also partnering with other reputable sector organisations to curate high-quality research events. This is an essential part of creating a genuinely collaborative and innovative research network, and we are encouraged by the increased likelihood of face-to-face activities occurring over the coming year. You can see our upcoming events here.
There’s a lot more planned. As the research gains momentum, the need for better sector collaboration will grow and we are keeping this front of mind as we develop our communications across the Centre.
If you have any questions or suggestions on how we can better communicate with our partners and others, please get in touch.