Developing a successful e-mail campaign
By Pattie LaCroix
January 31, 2005
Almost all of us do it at least twice a day. Usually we do it first thing
in the morning and before we go to bed at night. We all check our e-mail.
Jupiter research tells us that 92% of us go online to check our e-mail. A
whopping 1.2 billion e-mail accounts exist and are expected to receive more
than 36 billion messages this year, reports the International Data Corporation.
So clearly we like e-mail. In fact, it is the third most preferred way of
communicating, after fact-to-face interaction and the phone. But what does
this communication channel hold in store for the nonprofit sector? Well, here
in Canada there are about 90,000 registered charities and in 2003 Canadians
donated $8 billion dollars to them, along with two billion volunteer hours.
Using e-mail to communicate to donors and volunteers can provide a great boost
to nonprofit communications, marketing, and fundraising programs.
Through permission-based e-mail you can personalize your communications to
your donors and support and recruit volunteers. E-mail provides an opportunity
for engaging your supporters in a customized and highly personalized way.
In short, it lets you give them what they want when they want it. E-mail campaigns
can also play an integral part in your online fundraising program. Making
a solicitation online costs only 20 cents compared with $1 or more for each
direct mail or telephone solicitation, according to a McKinsey & Co. study
published in May 2003.
And like any communications tool, your e-mail is a powerful tool for extending
your organization's brand. By brand I mean the personality of your organization,
its values, and its story that uniquely identifies you with your audiences.
In short, your brand has a lot to do with why people feel good about supporting
your organization.
So when someone indicates that "yes, I would like to receive more information
about your work," they are responding to your brand and are open to having
a "conversation" with you. E-mail is a highly engaging way to turn that "conversation"
into a longer-term relationship of support for your organization.
The cornerstone of any e-mail campaign begins with planning. There are several
components to developing a successful one:
- Set your objectives - Set your objectives from the outset. Your
objectives should be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timely;
in other words your objectives should be SMART. An objective like 'raise
more funds for our programs' needs to be more specific, like 'increase revenue
by 10% for our annual walkathon'. These objectives should guide your e-mail
campaign.
- Be audience-centric - Gather as much relevant information about
your audience before you send out your e-mail campaign. Know your audience.
Understand the motivations and profile of your audience. Are they busy moms,
are they using dialup connections, do they respond to incentives? Over-communicate
audience control. For example, remind recipients that they agreed to receive
your e-mail and that they can unsubscribe or pass it on to their friends
if they wish. Forrester Research reported that two out of the three reasons
that people open their e-mail is that they agreed to receive it and they
recognize the sender. Create a preference centre if possible so that your
recipients can indicate what content they would like to receive by checking
off topics of interest.
- Demonstrate Value - Know your message; content should be clear
and concise. Engage, don't shout and repeat. All content, from the subject
line to links and body copy must contain value, not just information. Content
must engage. Ask yourself when writing your content, "what's in it for them?"
- Integrate, Integrate, Integrate - Your e-mail campaign will be
most effective in reaching its objectives when it is integrated with your
communications, marketing, and fundraising programs. Campaigns executed
in isolation won't benefit from the activities of these programs and vise
versa. There are many touch points at which your audience can engage with
your organization. Integration helps you be consistent and to maximize the
benefits of this engagement.
- Measure - Ensure that you can measure the performance of your e-mail
campaign against your original objectives. This information is key to providing
your supporters with personalized communications. Ensure that your e-mail
deployment provider can provide you with the reports that you need to measure
the success of your objectives.
- Support - Like any program, your e-mail campaign should be implemented
when you can provide it with the necessary resources and support. Strategic
leadership is required to plan, execute, and evaluate your e-mail campaign.
The results of your campaign, in turn, should be integrated into your master
database, thus completing the loop on building and sustaining relationships
for your organization.
Once the plan for your e-mail campaign is in place you can start working on the
creative. The look and feel of your campaign plays a fundamental role in its
success. More about that next month.
Pattie LaCroix has directed marketing and communications programs for
nonprofits for over ten years. As vice president of Communicopia, she is passionate
about creating online communications strategies for nonprofits that engage their
audience and build support for their work. You can contact Pattie through www.communicopia.net.
