Evaluation of Healthy Together Whittlesea pilot

How successful was a pilot website for the government’s Healthy Together Victoria initiative and could it be a sustainable and transferable online model for all participating local councils?

Our evaluation revealed a more flexible model that enables each local council in the Healthy Together Community to develop and sustain a unique, local digital presence.

Healthy Together Victoria (a joint initiative between the Victorian Department of Health and the federal government) is improving people’s health where they live, learn, work and play. The Healthy Whittlesea pilot website was established to deliver targeted health content to the local Whittlesea community.

A sustainable approach to scaling up

We evaluated the pilot website by:

• Developing an evaluation framework clearly identifying desired outcomes, goals and success criteria.
• Gathering evidence from site analytics, interviews, workshops and focus groups with stakeholders involved in the technical support and content management of the site, program staff (from across 12 regional centres) and relevant council staff. Surveying program and council technical and social media capacity and capabilities.

Our recommended model was a staged approach allowing local preventative health content and tools to be integrated into council websites over time – delivering sustainability over the longer term. Our advice also included actions to support the model’s implementation and deliver success through initiatives such as social media.