In the case of complex social problems such as obesity and environmental degradation, structural change is needed to provide people with the ability to change (Andreasen, 2006). Strategic social marketing has identified upstream social marketing as a method to influence structural change through policy makers (French & Gordon, 2015), however literature in the area tends to be descriptive and there are no clear guidelines to its implementation (Dibb, 2014). This article seeks to provide those guidelines. First it looks at the characteristics of policy makers targeted, then targeting methods, with a special focus on the use of media advocacy. Lastly a process of government decision making is presented to explain message timing and content.