Monthly Archive for April, 2008

Women Who Tech - Find them!

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Amy Sample Ward
on April 30, 2008
in community and events
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Did you participate in the Women Who Tech telesummit that took place earlier this month?  It is okay if you didn’t, because the podcasts of the sessions are available online!  There were so many terrific conversations that took place that day, and now you can access them any time.

You can also see pictures of the offline events that took place after the telesummmit on the Flickr group, here:  http://www.flickr.com/groups/womenwhotech.com

Women Who Tech brunches in cities across the country are in the works for the early summer.  Contact Women Who Tech if you want to be involved, or contact me if you want to be part of the Portland event!

Enter the DonateNow Mashup Challenge

Published
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Amy Sample Ward
on April 30, 2008
in fundraising
. 0 Comments

How would you mashup the Network for Good donation processing service with other services to make it easier for nonprofits to raise money online? Submit your ideas to the DonateNow Mashup Challenge sponsored by the Case Foundation by May 19.

Winners in each category will be awarded a $10,000 prize by a panel of judges present at the NetSquared Conference (N2Y3). In addition, each winner will be granted a one-year license for the Network for Good API to be donated to an organization of their choice (if the winner is an organization, it can choose to donate the API to itself).

There are two categories to enter:

1. Build a mashup using the Network for Good’s donation API, with a particular focus on enhancing the donor experience.
2. Build a mashup using the Network for Good’s donation API, with a particular focus on improving or revolutionizing a nonprofit organization’s ability to fundraise.

All project ideas must be submitted by May 19, 2008 at 5:00pm Pacific Time.

For more information on how to apply, go to: http://www.netsquared.org/mashup/donatenowchallenge

501 Tech Club - Conversations from the NTC

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Amy Sample Ward
on April 30, 2008
in events
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Today was the April 501 Tech Club brown bag lunch event and we focused on some of the best parts of NTEN’s NTC which took place last month.

It was a great chance to talk between conference goers about highlights and questions and even more exciting to have folks who hadn’t been to the conference ask questions to start conversations. Some of the areas that we touched on include:

  • Leadership: Technology staff have a great opportunity for developing leadership skills and helping navigate the organization, with technology-related issues as well as non-technology-related issues. It strengthens the organization to have technology staff a part of the leadership team. Likewise, it is incredibly important for execitve directors to gain technology knowledge so that when new, shiny, tools/toys come out (which seems to happen every day!), there is an understanding of what the organization can and can’t adopt and how.
  • ROI (Return on Investment): Specifically that of Social ROI, for social media, is a growing body of thought and practice with lots of conversations about different ways to measure social media work that doesn’t relate specifically to fundraising dollars. The most prominent component of social media is the community building and conversational nature of the tools, so the development of ways to measure and evaluate your organization’s use of these tools is integral.
  • Social Media Adoption: I was part of or overheard many conversations reinforcing the idea that organization’s can’t, and don’t have the staff/time/support/money, to adopt every tool that comes out. Instead, campaigns and projects need to be designed around the organization’s missions and then appropriate technology can be used when it is appropriate.
  • Communities of Practice: It was interesting to see puddles of people form because of common job functions and experiences that transcended session tracks or table topics. Groups like IT directors, peer-to-peer fundraisers, and non-technical staff that manage or work with online tools in their campaigns. It was great seeing the offline communities form with people who only knew each other online or through other friends. It is very important for people to build their support community because so many of us work in situations where we are the only IT staff person and it can be a lonely position.
  • Vendors: Many people enjoyed the opportunity to meet with and talk to vendor company representatives IN PERSON. Shaking the hand of someone from PayPal or Salesforce really changed the faceless, distant organization to companies with human employees that nonprofits can connect with.
  • Mobiles: A constantly growing field in the nonprofit technology world is that of mobile technology and the changing opportunities for nonprofits leveraging the power mobiles hold for reaching out to communities in need and in crisis. It is a great field to watch, and if you are interested in learning more about mobile technology, Mobile Active is an awesome organization to check out.

If you are interested in attending the next 501 Tech Club meeting in Portland, it is May 28th from 1-2:30 at the NW Health Foundation. We will focus on ‘Storytelling in Crises’ with a presentation from Roger Burks of Mercy Corps. You can find out more and join the community online at http://groups.nten.org.

And then there’s Advocacy

Published
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Amy Sample Ward
on April 27, 2008
in reports
. 0 Comments

As promised, I wanted to share some thoughts on the advocacy data included in the 2008 eNonprofit Benchmarks Study from M+R and NTEN (you can read about the email campaign data and the fundraising data, too).

Email Advocacy
The average rate for page completion (filling in a form, etc.) increased from 85% in 2006 to 89% in 2007. Things like improved layout and design of advocacy pages could be the reason for the increase, or that supporters are more comfortble/used to the forms and what to expect when clicking through to the page. I think it is also important to think about the inclusion of auto-complete/fill information either from a personal option on the users’ computers or through a cookie from your site.

Taking Action
Environmental and rights organizations each had about half of their membership taking action in 2007. That is well ahead of health and international organizations. Often, it is hard to simplify the best reason or couple reasons that contribute to the high action rates. Of course, doing everything ‘right’ doesn’t hurt! I suggest signing up on the list for organizations or campaigns that strikes/surprises/motivates/impresses you outside (or in) your sector of work and learn from the ways it is done - how the emails are done (how many, about what, etc.), how you are called to action, how you are rewarded for action if you do take it, etc.

One statistic that is very important to learn from is that of those who are active members, 13% are categorized as ’super activists’ but those 13% account for 42% of the action taken (in 2007). These super activists comprise about 5% of an organization’s list. These are very important members. That much goes without saying; but, what does it mean for your organization’s interaction with them? It’s important to investigate and develop ways for super activists to do the work of cultivating less active or inactive members into taking action, so that you don’t have to. Building a system for interaction between members can allow for further actions that include inviting others to become active when you do, or suggesting actions to your contacts, etc.

Case Studies
#1. Human Rights Campaign

The HRC increased its advocacy response rates in 2007 by a full percentage point and contribute this increase to segmentation of its list. It split the list into five sub-lists based on the members’ past activities/interactions with the organization. HRC could then communicate in a more tailored way with the members on each list.

Today, everyone on the list gets one advocacy action and the one email newsletter per month, plus a fundraising campaign every 2-3 months. Beyond that, audiences for emails are based on demonstrated interest. For example, extra action alerts only go to people who’ve already shown an interest in that issue and to core activists (who have taken 5+ online actions in the page year). Special fundraising campaigns target recent donors. Higher-threshold actions like phone calls and letters to the editor never go to inactives.

Even though there may be fewer people receiving an important action, it is directed at the members more likely to actually do it, instead of becoming another email to someone frustrated by action alerts who only subscribes for the news and information.

#2. Environmental Defense

ED noticed that they were earning 40% of their dollars in the year-end and that people gave at the same rate regardless of how many emails when looking at the data from three consecutive Decembers. In 2007, they took a random 15% of their list and those members received only 3 messages while the rest of the list received 13 (between Thanksgiving and December 31st). The group receiving only 3 messages had a lower donation rate so they plan to do further list testing to find the ’sweet spot’ with their members. What has been the result of list tests like this; if you haven’t yet done any segmenting or testing, do you plan to?

An interesting test that ED conducted on their website took place right on the home page. They used a graphic with polar bears and a call to action for contributions, in one instance, and in the other simply put the donation form in the same spot (top, center of the home page). What they noticed was an increase of 8% more gifts with the donation form, 8% more donations of $1,000 or less and 10% more donations of %500 or less. The lesson they learned was to just put the option completely in front of the visitor, take out all possible clicks, and let them decide right away if they are going to give or not.

What has been the best advocacy campaign/call to action in the last year at your organization? What data did you collect (either quantitative or qualitative) that helped you plan for the next one?

Online fundraising’s little tricks

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on April 25, 2008
in fundraising and reports
. 1 Comment

As I started discussing yesterday, M+R and NTEN released the2008 eNonprofit Benchmarks Study and there is quite a bit of data to get through.  Today, I want to share some of my thoughts about the fundraising benchmarks highlighted in the report and one of the case studies discussed in the report’s launch presentation.

Fundraising Response Rates
It was mentioned in the previous post as well that messaging response rates, including those of fundraising messages, were down last year compared to 2006.  There is a bit of trickiness to that data though:  even though the response rates declined, the overall amount raised online continues to go up partly because of the fact that the average email list has grown by a factor that is larger than the decline in response rates.

The declining open rates still convince me to look for ways to integrate calls into one message so that you have actions/advocacy, fundraising opportunities, and news/information in every email so it isn’t a one shot or nothing deal.

Online Giving
On average, organizations raised 40% of the online giving in Q4 (October-December).  This trend is true as well for gift size.  The study found that gift size dramatically increased at the end of the year (same was true in 2006).  So, the obvious lesson here is to cultivate as many donations as possible at the end of the year.

It seems to me, though, that just as much as you should cultivate donors/donations at year-end, you should find new ways of engaging them in your fundraising needs in other times of the year.  Remember that tying fundraising appeals to current events and other communication campaigns as another option for support (it’s really just another call to action) can bring in new donors and help you identify what issues the supporters care most about.

Case Studies
#1.  Humane Society of the United States

One of the profiles included in the study focuses on the HSUS’ fundraising success.  There are a few things they did to improve their fundraising response rates, one of them was that:

They recruited new advocates on high profile advocacy campaigns, and then converted the new advocates to donors by sending fundraising appeals on the same issue.  This strategy has proved so successful for HSUS that the organization has decided to customize its rolling welcome appeal for new advocates so that new advocates hear from HSUS on the same issue they joined the email list on.  HSUS has extended this segmentation strategy to other appeals, too, by targeting list members with appeals based on those advocates’ and donors’ past online actions.

I think it is incredibly important to note that they didn’t take frequent or high impact DONORS to target in a more direct way with fundraising, but frequent and high impact ACTION-TAKERS.  Fundraising is often not very low on the ladder of engagement with new members.  It makes sense to cultivate other involvement with the organization and then approach with donation opportunities.

#2.  Amnesty International USA

During the report release conference call/webinar/live event, a representative from AI explained some interesting learning they went through with their website and online giving.  Here are some of the areas they made changes and saw results:

  • Changing the web confirmation to donation form raised $46,000+ since December and indicates which issue inspires the donor (this is a confirmation when taking action, filling out a form, etc.)
  • Changing the standard gray “submit” (or “donate” and so on) button on the donation form to a large red “submit” button, they saw a 29% lift in conversion rate.
  • Adding some right-pointing arrows to a “donate” graphic on the home page provided a 5% lift in overall traffic to the donation form and a 55% lift in total dollars raised

It is incredible to think what tiny changes can be made on your website, especially ones like these that take very little time to implement, that can drastically improve your online fundraising success.

There is one more section to the benchmarks study that I’m going to cover tomorrow (the section on Advocacy).  The fundraising section really creates just as many questions as the email data from yesterday.

Where do you find out the most information about a donor right now and how is that reflected on your website?  How are you currently designing ways to cultivate donors outside of the October-December high season?

Enter the DonateNow Mashup Challenge sponsored by the Case

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on April 25, 2008
in events and fundraising
. 0 Comments

How would you mashup the Network for Good donation processing service with other services to make it easier for nonprofits to raise money online? Submit your ideas to the DonateNow Mashup Challenge sponsored by the Case Foundation by May 19.

Winners in each category will be awarded a $10,000 prize by a panel of judges present at the NetSquared Conference (N2Y3). In addition, each winner will be granted a one-year license for the Network for Good API
to be donated to an organization of their choice (if the winner is an organization, it can choose to donate the API to itself).

There are two categories to enter:

1. Build a mashup using the Network for Good’s donation API, with a particular focus on enhancing the donor experience.

2. Build a mashup using the Network for Good’s donation API, with a particular focus on improving or revolutionizing a nonprofit organization’s ability to fundraise.

All project ideas must be submitted by May 19, 2008 at 5:00pm Pacific Time.

For more information on how to apply, go to: http://www.netsquared.org/mashup/donatenowchallenge

How do your benchmarks compare?

Published
by
Amy Sample Ward
on April 24, 2008
in reports
. 2 Comments

Today, M+R Strategic Services and NTEN released the 2008 eNonprofit Benchmarks Study.

This “analysis of online messaging, fundraising and advocacy metrics for nonprofit organization” comes with some surprises and some data that shouldn’t surprise anyone who has been paying attention to their online benchmarks. The NonProfit Times has a piece on the report here.

I read it this morning and participated in a webinar/conference call with the producers of the report this afternoon. Some of my thoughts are below, and many more will follow in additional posts. If you want to download the report, you can do so right here.

Data and thoughts…

Email Open Rates
One of the first pieces of information most of us look at when considering our effectiveness online is the open rate for email campaigns. As the report indicates, open rates have continued to trend down—2007’s rate was 17.6% with 2006 being at 21.3%. One important factor to remember, though, that really messes with the validity of these numbers, is the the way opens are indicated. Usually there is a one pixel size image that is embedded in the email so that when it loads on the viewer’s screen, the sender’s server is indicated and a open is registered. Many email applications have a preview window that loads an email even if the viewer doesn’t read it. Alternatively, most email clients viewed in a web browser are set by default not to load images. So, a viewer could read an email and even click through to take action or donate, with an open never being registered on the sender’s server.

People have so many emails to get through every day and it is only increasing. My question to consider then, is how do you become a resource or include value in every email without overwhelming the reader? You still want them to click on the donate or take action links, but by increasing the value of the content of your emails (value doesn’t necessarily only mean information, but options for action, etc.), you can increase your open rate and the number of clickthroughs for donations or action because of the visibility.

Message Type
The report measures the success of emails (open rate, clickthroughs, page completion, and response rate) by the three main message types: fundraising, news, advocacy. Rates have declined for each type from 2006 to 2007 but advocacy actions generated slightly higher open rates and significantly higher clickthrough, page completion and response rates. This says to me: provide options for advocacy and fundraising and news in every message! Diversifying your email lists is important, and there is certainly a lot to the impact those more tailored emails get - but that doesn’t mean that they can’t have tailored and appropriate messages for all three areas in an email.

Clickthrough Rates
In this area, the rates vary by issue sector. The environmental organizations that participated (you can find out which organizations were included in the survey here), had the highest clickthrough rates of all participants. What do their email newsletters have that yours don’t? Are they offering/linking to compelling videos and photos? Maybe including compelling stories and reports that require the reader to click through to the website to continue reading or download. Or, maybe there is a link to community features that require leaving the email.

Message Frequency & Subscribers
The report’s findings indicate a correlation between the number of emails sent and the open rate: “when an organization sent five or more emails per subscriber in a month, the open rate dropped by 1%.” Likewise, “the more messages an organization sends, the higher its unsubscribe rate for that month.” This doesn’t mean that you should be wary of emailing your lists. On the contrary. Focus on key questions though, like: What is pertinent, relates to current events, contributes to a campaign, creates positive actions for members? Or, how can we combine some of these smaller messages into a compelling story or segmented email? Don’t let data that could seem negative, cause fear. It’s good to question what you are doing though so that you can really be sure to send the best messages you have to your members.

There are really so many questions that this report brings to mind that should be discussed and not hidden. I encourage you to ask a hard question about some of your data, and get excited for positive places you can go with the answers.

What benchmarks have you seen your organization’s email campaigns hitting or missing? What do you want to be with your data - and are those goals realistic based on these benchmarks?

I’m going to follow this up with some posts on the fundraising data from the report and discussion of some case studies used to flesh out the numbers.

Pledging for change

Published
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Amy Sample Ward
on April 23, 2008
in events
. 0 Comments

Last night was the April Net Tuesday here in Portland. We had Heather Cronk with us from PledgeBank to talk about online campaign building (both with PB and the general topic). It was quite a lively discussion, answering questions and leaving participants with others to think about in their organizations.

Some of the main take-aways from her presentation and our discussion are summarized below:

A great place to start your conversation about online organizing is to think about offline organizing. Successful offline campaigns include activities like:

  • canvassing
  • door knocking
  • phone banking
  • flyering

All of the messages in the offline campaigns are controlled. When you get to the door, you can’t change the language in the flyer to more personally match the person who answers. You can’t determine, either, that people will be ready to talk to you when you come to their door.

With online organizing, successful campaigns can include activities like:

  • email
  • blogs
  • podcasts
  • rss
  • APIs/widgets

These are all distributed messages. You or your organization can create the messaging and put it in a place where it is more easily disseminated than offline organization. Instead of requiring you to go door to door in a specific neighborhood, you can create and post the content in a place that people from all over can receive it.

With ‘web 2.0′, supporters don’t just read your messages, they can create their own content, interact with your content or with other supporters. Content can now also include:

  • wikis
  • videos and photos
  • peer to peer interaction/connection

This is the age of user-generated. People no longer want only to be a supporter, giving a donation for your cause at the time of physically meeting you on the street or participating in your fundraising event. Now, supporters can create their own widgets and fundraising tools to support you in their own way, often using their own version of your story and message.

Pledgebank and other similar sites offer a way for an individual or group with a good idea to create change, to make a commitment with the support of others. But, do people follow through on their pledges? PB did a survey of money-based pledges and found that about 75% of pledgers followed through. Of that 75%, they pledged anywhere from 75% to 150% of the amount they pledge.

It is easy to think ‘too big’ at first. You may want to march on Washington about your cause. It could be very difficult though to successfully mobilize thousands of people to show up and march with you. Instead, you could start with a petition and working to many people to sign it. Then, encourage people to call their representatives personally. Once you are able to successfully mobilize people to do that, you can work on local organizing events, and so forth. Build up to the march on Washington by building a quality, active membership first.

Some tools and resources include:

  • dotorganize.net - they have done surveys on how people are using the social web
  • netsquared.org and techsoup.org - resources on cheap software and also good community for questions and support
  • nten.org - great learning opportunities and participation with a knowledgeable community
  • new organizing institute - great resources on their wiki
  • onenw.org - much like dotorganize
  • aspirationtech.org - great workshps and curriculum
  • idealware.org - compares tools for you

Portland Net Tuesday is a great place to learn from, share with, and meet new people in the local nonprofit and technology fields. People working for in the changemaking arena come together each month to discuss technology tools, organizational challenges and successes, and ways technology can be used to help our organizations meet the missions and goals. Check us out and attend a meeting!

Stories as the answer

Published
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amysampleward
on April 18, 2008
in storytelling
. 0 Comments

Storytelling is a big hot topic for nonprofits - especially when it is done in a digital or dynamic way. Kivi Leroux Miller wrote a great post today about five key questions about organizations that should be answered with stories.

Her list includes:

1) What Do Other People Think About This Group?

Answer with Testimonials. When someone is learning about you for the first time, they’ll be curious what other people think about your organization, your staff and your effectiveness. You can talk about how great you are, but that’s not nearly as convincing as testimonials from other people who aren’t on your payroll (or even on your board).

2) Are People Here Like Me?

Answer with Profiles. When someone donates time or money to your organization, they are joining a virtual community of people who believe in the same cause. If someone is not quite sure if your nonprofit is a good fit for them, showing them that they fit in with other supporters can help overcome that barrier.

3) Does This Work?

Answer with Success Stories. Do you get the job done? Are you going to make a difference with the money I give you? Success stories show donors (and potential new donors) exactly what it is you do and how you do it.

4) What Difference Can a Single Person Make?

Answer with Personalized Giving Options. Big problems are overwhelming. If you swamp people with the enormity of the need, they are likely to tune you out and move on to something that feels more manageable. 

5) Can I Come Along?

Answer with Personal Chronicles. For your supporters to fully engage with your nonprofit, you have to be willing to share what’s really going on. A small but important segment of your donor base won’t be happy with the level of detail they get in your newsletters. They’ll want more and you should give it to them.

To read the rest of the details and examples, click here.

The one question I think is missing, is: Who are you?

It is important to remember that your organization is made up of humans who do all have lives outside of the office and have passions that have brought them to the same organization for a reason.  It is important to showcase your wonderful changemakers, both to recognize them as complete people, and to show your audience/community/supporters/members that they can identify with individuals in the organization and not just the mission.

How do you do this? With blogs, videos, pictures, etc.  There are many ways to show that your organization is made of great people.  Take pictures at your next staff meeting and have everyone make their own nametag with paper and crayons to hold up for the photo.  Let everyone create a short 10-30 second video about how they discovered the organization and wanted to start working there.  Start a blog on the website for staff to contribute to about things other than specific press releases, project announcements, etc.

How are you using storytelling in your organization?  What is another question that you would add to this list that could be answered with stories?

A friend’s race - inspiration and fundraising

Published
by
amysampleward
on April 18, 2008
in fundraising
. 0 Comments

I have a good friend, Alletta, who is currently studying [and getting yet another degree] in London. We grew up together and attend the same schools until college. She has, for nearly as long as I have known her, suffered from migraines and gone through many rounds of possible causes and treatments. I want to share with you some of her story:

Last May, I ran my first marathon in Edinburgh and despite being ill most of the winter and poorly trained, managed to finish on my own two legs with a respectable time of five hours and forty-eight minutes. This year on May 11th I am giving it another go, except this time I am taking on a much more difficult race on the Isle of Wight and aim to shave more than an hour off of my time to finish in four and a half hours instead.

Running a marathon last year was a life-changing experience. Though becoming increasingly active in recent years, I never considered myself to be athletic. Suffering from asthma and frequent migraines, I have often found strenuous exercise to be very challenging. A few years ago I would have never thought it possible that I could run at all, let alone run 26.3 miles. Now I have been awakened to the possibility of pushing myself in totally new ways and deeply inspired as to what we are all capable of.

I am using my running of the Isle of Wight marathon this year as an opportunity to not only challenge myself, but as a chance to contribute something good to the world by supporting a charity that is close to my heart, the London Migraine Clinic.

The London Migraine Clinic, where I myself am a patient, is a world-class non-profit institution that seeks to help individuals suffering from migraines to find the root causes for their pain and to help them better manage these triggers. In addition, it supports important research into why migraines happen and how the millions of us who get these debilitating headaches can better take control over our health and our lives. To learn more about the Clinic’s work click here.

I think Alletta’s experience is inspirational and honorable. It has been wonderful seeing her come to take on and achieve such high goals for herself. There is no surprise to me that she has found a way to give back to the nonprofit clinic that has helped her with migraines and is helping so many others in London and around the world with their care and research.

Please support me this year in my quest to run the Isle of Wight Marathon and help the London Migraine Clinic in its work by making a donation! Just go to the following link: http://www.colmc.org.uk/ and click on the left-hand tab of “How We are Funded” then on “Donate Now.

There is no where to leave comments when you donate, so please share with me if you would like to about your support or questions so I can be sure to connect you with answers and with Alletta. Thanks, and keep up the race (be it a marathon or life, you are all so inspirational to me!)!