Polymers containing coumarin and Ru(BpyMe(2))(3)(2+) chromophores were synthesized using a grafting approach and also a copolymerization approach. It was found that the solubility of polymers made from Ru-containing monomers was higher than that observed for comparable polymers obtained by grafting of Ru complexes onto bpy-containing prepolymers. The resulting bichromophoric macromolecules exhibited enhanced absorption and luminescence properties compared to the single Ru(BpyMe(2))(3)(2+) complexes due to a very efficient (>95%) energy transfer between the coumarin donor dyes and the ruthenium chromophores. In addition, a novel system in which two different donor dyes are present together with the Ru complex was synthesized and also found to deliver efficient energy transfer to the ruthenium complexes.