How to reach thousands of monthly users: data-driven recommendations for the development of a public water and climate tool

Abstract:

The Climate Toolbox (www.climatetoolbox.org) is a free, public website that allows users to interact with past, present and future climate and water data. The toolbox is intended for natural resource managers, policy makers, scientists, and the wider community. Via a variety of analysis tools, users can quickly inspect large, gridded datasets. For example, users can investigate regional snowpack and soil moisture conditions in their area and assess the likelihood of future drought conditions. Or, users can inspect regional subseasonal (next few weeks) to seasonal (next few months) forecasts or climate projections (next few decades) for a variety of meteorological and hydrologic variables. The tool is partially supported by the National Integrated Drought Information System and developed in partnership with the Climate Impacts Research Consortium. Toolbox traffic has increased from ~50 unique visitors per month in 2016 to a strong base exceeding 1000 monthly users now. In this presentation, we will show how growth in site traffic has responded to website development, outreach events, and project growth. We will share the most (and least) effective actions and strategies in growing the Toolbox into a widely-used decision-making tool. We will also provide comments from highly involved “superusers” with feedback on effective tool development strategies.