making campaigning count

Health Check and Benchmarking

Advocacy Online Community Conference22 September 2010By Duane Raymondduane.raymond@fairsay.com

Session Overview

Community health check and benchmarking“It is important to keep an eye of the ‘health’ of an online

community, which is often mistakenly evaluated as the size of the email list alone. But a list that grows by 10% each year and generates less activity needs some immediate medical attention.

We look at some key benchmarks for evaluating the health of your online community: list churn, engagement level, email response rates, overall growth, etc. This session will also look at the tools in the Advocacy Online platform to help get some of the critical benchmark data.”

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What ‘health checks’ do you do?

Six community health indicators

1. Participation rate from email2. Activity levels3. Organic growth rate4. Hurdle rate5. Email open rates6. Spontaneous social media activity

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Measure the indicators

Indicators

1. Participation rate from email

2. Activity levels3. Organic growth rate4. Churn rate5. Email open rates6. Spontaneous social

media activity

Measures• # completed (of

emailed) / # emailed• % 0/1/2/3+ actions• #new/(total# - new#)• # lost / total #• Compare with recent• e.g. Blog, Facebook,

Twitter and Delicious posts

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Putting it into PracticeUsing eActivist 3.0

Now let’s try it in e-activist

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Indicators

1. Participation rate from email

2. Activity levels3. Organic growth rate4. Churn rate5. Email open rates6. Spontaneous social

media activity

Measures• # completed (of

emailed) / # emailed• % 0/1/2/3+ actions• #new/(total# - new#)• # lost / total #• Compare with recent• e.g. Blog, Facebook,

Twitter and Delicious posts

Act on your findings

1. Record what you initially find. This is the ‘baseline’2. Compare the baseline to the eCampaigning Review3. Try something new/different, ideally as a split-test4. Record and compare the new results5. Adopt / reject / re-try the new / different approach6. Repeat with other new / different approaches

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Improving community health

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If these are too low

1. Participation rate from email

2. Activity levels3. Organic growth rate4. Churn rate5. Email open rates6. Spontaneous social

media activity

Try this• More compelling

emails and actions• Re-activation emails• Ask to tell others• Prevent poor data• Optimised emails• Find out what and how

people like sharing and provide more

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Best practice levels

• It depends on your objectives.• If your objectives are to mobilise and recruit then:

Key Indicators Best Practice Level

Participation rate (of email received) 25% (35% with chaser)

Attraction Rate (of actions) 33%

Opt-in rate (of new) 55%

Recruitment rate (of actions) 17%

Cost / recruit (variable costs) £2-£3

Avg. donation value £16

Conversion to donors 0.5%

Open Rates (from ECR 2009)

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0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

Action alert Newsletter Update

Email Style

Open Rate

Click Rate

Click-to-Open Rate

Action-to-Click Rate

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What else to look for?

• Patterns: consistent or inconsistent• Unexpected results: good, bad,

strange• Opportunities for analysis in the

data e.g. political, allies, targets• Do multiple indicators support the

same conclusion?

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What do you see?

New Supporters Per Year

0

5000

10000

15000

20000

25000

1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007

Year of Joining

# o

f su

pp

ort

ers

wh

o c

amp

aig

n

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What do you see?

New Supporters per Quarter

0

2000

4000

6000

8000

10000

12000

14000

16000

2004

Q1

2004

Q2

2004

Q3

2004

Q4

2005

Q1

2005

Q2

2005

Q3

2005

Q4

2006

Q1

2006

Q2

2006

Q3

2006

Q4

2007

Q1

2007

Q2

2007

Q3

2007

Q4

Year & Quarter

# o

f n

ew s

up

po

rter

s w

ho

cam

pai

gn

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What do you see?

Volume of Emails Sent

0

5,000

10,000

15,000

20,000

25,000

30,000

35,000

40,000

EM43

3 (1

8/10

/2004

)

EM43

4 (3

0/11

/2004

)

EM43

8 (2

3/04

/2005

)

EM44

8 (1

5/09

/2005

)

EM45

4 (1

2/10

/2005

)

EM52

6 (1

6/02

/2006

)

EM53

0 (1

5/03

/2006

)

EM53

2 (1

8/04

/2006

)

EM53

6 (1

6/05

/2006

)

EM54

1 (1

5/06

/2006

)

EM54

3 (1

8/07

/2006

)

EM55

2 (1

3/09

/2006

)

EM55

6 (1

7/10

/2006

)

EM57

5 (1

2/02

/2007

)

EM57

9 (1

4/03

/2007

)

EM58

6 (0

4/07

/2007

)

EM61

5 (2

1/11

/2007

)

EM62

5 (1

2/12

/2007

)

Email Number and Date

# S

up

po

rter

Em

aile

d

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What do you see?

Activity Level per Supporter Type (All)

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

70%

80%

90%

100%

0 1 2 3 3 5

# Actions Completed (All Supporters)

% o

f S

up

po

rte

r T

yp

e

Campaigner Only Campaigner-Donor Donor-Campaigner

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What do you see?

Supporter Age at Signup & Now

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

%10

-17

%18

-24

%25

-29

%30

-34

%35

-39

%40

-44

%45

-49

%50

-54

%55

-59

%60

-64

%65

-69

%70

+

Age Range

% o

f s

up

po

rte

rs

Age at Signup Age 06 Age 08

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What do you see?

Response Rate: Emailing to Action

0%

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

Best P

racti

ce

EM43

3 (1

8/10/0

4)

EM43

4 (3

0/11/0

4)

EM43

8 (2

3/04/0

5)

EM44

8 (1

5/09/0

5)

EM45

4 (1

2/10/0

5)

EM53

0 (1

5/03/0

6)

EM53

2 (1

8/04/0

6)

EM53

6 (1

6/05/0

6)

EM54

1 (1

5/06/0

6)

EM54

3 (1

8/07/0

6)

EM55

2 (1

3/09/0

6)

EM55

6 (1

7/10/0

6)

EM57

5 (1

2/02/0

7)

EM58

6 (0

4/07/0

7)

EM61

5 (2

1/11/0

7)

EM62

5 (1

2/12/0

7)

Emailing (Date)

Res

po

nse

Rat

e