Engage people with Campaign IT Strategy

June 23, 2009 at 6:30 pm | In Communications tools and tips, Email Campaigns, Marketing Campaigns, Not-for-profit Campaigns, Political Campaigns | Leave a Comment

Last month, while trying to answer the questions “What is a Campaign?” and “How do I get people to join?” I teased you with only 1 of the Five I’s of campaign strategy. I promised that I would deliver the rest this month.

I’m going to do one better. Well, two better actually.

The first 5 I’s listed here are the classic steps to move people through a campaign. The final I and the T I’ve added. I think they are critical for any type of campaign (marketing, election, outreach, fund raising, etc) but I would argue that they are especially critical if you are mounting an online campaign.

Every campaign starts with people and grows with people. Here’s how.

1. Identify: Research is the cornerstone of a campaign. Who wants what you want? Look around and see who’s really around you. How close are they? Where are pockets of new people who have demonstrated an interest in what you do? Be specific. The more specifically you identify people, and targeted groups of people, the more power you have to reach them.

2. Interest: Think about what it will take to attain and maintain the interest of the people you have identified. And think about how you will know if you have captured their interest. Some identifiers are: people don’t hang up on you, people sign up for your e-newsletters, someone asks you to repeat yourself, online search and activity data.

3. Inform: Get people the information that they need to support you, and connect it to the interest they have demonstrated. Use websites, social networking updates, newsletters, meetings, proposals, fliers, events, ads – once someone has demonstrated an interest it is just polite to keep them well-informed, and it keeps them engaged.

I’m a big fan of e-newsletters because you can continuously feed interested people valuable information that keeps them engaged AND you can track their interest with online stats.

For example, we will be keeping NDP supporters in Oak Bay-Gordon Head informed about the issues and events that they responded to during the election. We will also use the e-newsletters to identify people who can be moved to get involved.

4. Involve: This is where things shift. This is where people start doing something for you. A person can demonstrate their involvement in your campaign by inviting you to speak at an event, by making the effort to come to your office to meet, by volunteering, introducing you to people,  using your service, forwarding an email, opening up a discussion by posting a comment on a blog or retweeting an update on twitter. When people get involved, they are active in your community. Some people will inform themselves with information available and  contact you to ask you how they can get involved, but some people need to be asked.

Once you have identified, interested and informed people, it should be quite natural for you to offer to build that relationship by asking them to get involved.

5.    Invest: When you know someone is ready to buy in, make your ask. Ask for their vote, their donation, their purchase, whatever the ultimate goal is – ask. But make sure you’ve done everything you could to ensure that the only natural response will be “yes”, in other words make sure you have successfully moved them through the previous 4 steps.

Bonus Steps

6.    Inspire: Once people know you, and they have invested in you, encourage them to inspire others to move through the cycle. Donors  become canvassers. Voters drive other voters to the polls. And happy customers sell their friends on your product or service. And so the movement grows. But inspiring people to grow a movement takes really deep engagement,  so don’t skip steps.

Ask them explicitly to inspire others. Teach them how to effectively inspire others. Set up systems that make it easy for them to inspire others.  And don’t fall into the trap of thinking that things just “become” viral these days.

7.    Thank: Always say thank you. Don’t ever stop. If someone gives you the gift of breathing life into your organization, or your cause by sharing a little bit of their life with you, they deserve your appreciation. This is totally non-negotiable. Say thank you. A lot.

Why I said yes to Jessica Van der Veen’s political campaign

June 4, 2009 at 7:30 am | In Communications tools and tips, Not-for-profit Campaigns, Political Campaigns, Speech writing | Leave a Comment

It’s pretty easy to get me to say yes – if the right person, asks me the right thing, at the right time (the golden rule of fund raising, sales and generally getting what you want in this world).

To illustrate this, I’m going to gush about some campaign work I said “yes” to this spring.

For 4 weeks, I had the privilege of writing for a candidate who ran in BC’s provincial election. I produced an email campaign designed to support her live campaign and we enjoyed solid results:

  • online donation spikes
  • strong event attendance
  • people thanking the candidate for reaching out and making them part of her campaign.

Now, most of what I did, I did from home. Like usual, I had a couple of in person meetings in Victoria, emailed or phoned her staff daily, and wove narratives and arguments to engage her Oak Bay-Gordon Head community from the comfort and calmness of my Gabriola home.

But the last days of her campaign were different. I went to Victoria and camped out with her team for the final push.

With the newsletters written and cued, I was able to say, “Just point me where you need me.” And they did.

I got to help prep Jess for a call-in radio show, to co-write speeches, I went door to door to get out the vote, and on election night, I stood magic-marker-in-hand in the campaign office, capturing poll results as they were phoned in. I loved all of it.

Being a member of Jessica’s campaign team made me feel like I was contributing – not to a party, but to a system that makes it possible for a friend – a woman I admire – to run for office, and to a system that makes it possible for me to help. That’s why I joined her campaign, because I could.

That, and because Jess asked me.

Which reminds me of a classic campaign rule – it is so simple that we sometimes forget it – don’t forget to ask.

What is a campaign? And how do you get people to join you?

May 30, 2009 at 9:18 pm | In Communications tools and tips, Email Campaigns, Marketing Campaigns, Not-for-profit Campaigns, Political Campaigns, building brands | Leave a Comment

What do you think of when you hear the word campaign?

Political? Social justice? Fund raising? Military? Marketing? Save the whales? Sales?
All of the above?

campaign |kam’pān|
noun

a series of operations intended to achieve a particular objective, confined to a particular area, for a specified amount of time and involving a specified form of engagement.

campaign |kam’pān|
verb

to work in an organized and active way toward a goal

Campaigns are dance between people, stories, desires, deeds and time.

When I got my first job in fund raising, I was pretty uncomfortable with the idea of soliciting donations because, gulp someone might say “no”.

Luckily I had a great mentor who put me at ease with this simple statement, “If you are afraid someone will say ‘no’ don’t ask. When you know they are going to say ‘yes’ – ask!”

So how do you know if someone is ready to say yes?

  • You know them (their story, desires, abilities & deeds)
  • they know you (your story, desires, abilities & deeds)
  • you can match their needs with your deeds
  • the timing is right (no rushing)
  • they are empowered and enabled to act

Moving people to action in any kind of campaign (well OK, maybe not military) requires moving them through: The 5 I’s

1. Identify Find people you know (because you know their their story, desires, abilities and deeds) will take an interest. These are your potential donors, target market, likely voters, etc. Finding them takes time, research and relationship building, but your campaign is no where without these people. (Hint: start with the people who know and love you – lowest hanging fruit.)

    For the rest of the 5 I’s, tune in next month – I know I’m terrible. Email me if you (or our campaign) really can’t wait ;)

    Digital Good Deeds

    March 22, 2009 at 5:05 pm | In Client Work, Not-for-profit Campaigns | Leave a Comment

    This list of digital good deeds was part of something I sent out with the National Digital Media Day campaign. Maybe there’s still some good that can come of it…

    We are in an amazingly fortunate situation. With a very simple click of a button, any one of us can DO something to help people around the world. Here’s how.

    Click Free Rice Play an online vocabulary building game to feed the hungry. The more words you get right, the more rice will be donated by the UN World Food Program to developing nations.

    Click Microlending It is taking off online. This week alone over 1,500 entrepreneurs were helped through KIVA loans. You can loan KIVA as little as $25 and support multiple initiatives.

    Click Good Words For Africa Scrabble Kit Can you imagine helping African grandmothers caring for AIDS orphans by playing a board game?Stephen Lewis Foundation has developed a fun download so you can do just that.

    Click Connect Your Friends to Your CauseSet up an online fund raising page of your own using Give Meaning and invite your social network to support a cause that you care about.

    Click Be a Mentor Do you have skills that you want to share with the developing world?Sawa can partner you with a local hero in a developing nation who needs your skills.

    10,000 Free eNewsletters for Not-for-Profits

    January 31, 2009 at 12:11 pm | In Email Campaigns, Not-for-profit Campaigns | Leave a Comment

    Recently, VerticalResponse (the tool I use to produce my eNewsletter, and some client eNewsletters) announced:

    Promote Your Non-Profit Freely

    At VerticalResponse, we are inspired by the work non-profits do, so we want to make it easier. Now you can save your donors’ dollars for other crucial projects. If your organization is a 501(c)(3)*, then you’re eligible to send up to 10,000 emails per month. Free!

    I checked, they are extending this offer to Canadian non-profits too. And there’s no indication that this is a limited time offer bait and switch. This is a very good company.

    In fact, I just signed up the Lulu Performing Arts Society. They signed up to better promote their performances, reach out to their community and gain valuable intel on the ratio of people who see the invites, to people who buy tickets! Once we know that, we have a base line and that aids all kinds of planning.

    If you have a favorite non-profit, or if you work with non profits, send them these links.

    Non Profits need to click here to sign up for an account (Any one can use this link to get a free trial of Vertical Response).

    Then click here to register your non-profit status.

    In addition to the fr@e delivery and tracking service, VR offers fr@e webinars about email campaigns and fr@e survey tools. Folks can get up to speed very quickly.

    There are other tools specifically designed to help non profits launch professional email campaigns, Network for Good has one for example, but I don’t know of any that donate their service.

    Sending your favourite charity to the link above is like sending them $10 – $50 every month, depending on what they currently pay for eNewsletter delivery. And if your favourite charity doesn’t send an eNewsletter, you might want to talk to them about how this now-fr@e tool could improve their donor drives, volunteer calls, community engagement and advocacy efforts.

    And mention that according to Jeanne Jennings article in ClickZ, the Direct Marketing Association found, “E-mail is a relationship medium, meaning it helps develop, build, and strengthen connections… It’s especially effective at eliciting response from current [contacts].” Or send them to me. I love making making it easy for people to connect.

    *501 (c)(3) is an American charitable status but Canadians don’t need it for this

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