How to Borrow from Obama s Online Fundraising Playbook

Size: px

Start display at page:

Download "How to Borrow from Obama s Online Fundraising Playbook"

Noreen Dickerson
8 years ago
Views:

How to Borrow from Obama s Online Fundraising Playbook By: Mandy O Neill, President, ConnectedNonprofit The 2012 Obama Campaign juggernaut is on track to become the first billion dollar campaign in

1 How to Borrow from Obama s Online Fundraising Playbook By: Mandy O Neill, President, ConnectedNonprofit The 2012 Obama Campaign juggernaut is on track to become the first billion dollar campaign in history reporting last week a staggering $86M in fundraising success for the second quarter 2011: $47M for the campaign and $38M for the Democratic National Committee (DNC) to spend in support of the 2012 campaign. In 2008, Obama shattered records raising a campaign war chest of $750M and signing up 1.5 million volunteers via Is your Board or CEO asking. why can t we do that? Or even a fraction of that? You can easily borrow from Obama s playbook to lift your online fundraising results almost immediately. Whether you are red state or blue state, you can benefit from analyzing how Obama s campaign engages online during the rest of this 2012 campaign. There are sure to be plenty of tips you can use immediately to engage and inspire your supporters in the coming months, but for the past 90 days, the gems from this campaign are: Goals and Deadlines. The campaign reframed and measured success differently than the same old tired measure. The campaign set a goal of 450,000 grassroots donors by June 30 th. They did not set monetary target, but an engagement target, which gave them a distinct message from other political organizations. When the campaign hit its stated goal a day early, they didn t stop. They upped the goal to 475,000 and surpassed that new goal, with 493,000 donors, by midnight the next day, June 30th, which was the reporting cut-off.

2 Online Advertising. According to FEC reports, while the campaign isn t yet running television commercials, the campaign spent $700,000 in May for online advertising. President Obama launched his reelection campaign in early April with a huge online ad splash aimed at reenergizing his supporters. It seems to be working. The campaign is using basic behavioral ad tracking technology that has grown in prevalence among political advertisers and is available to nonprofit organizations as well. Visitors to the campaign site are receiving retargeting cookies from online ad networks including AOL's Advertising.com, Yahoo's BlueLithium, and Google. In the future, they will most likely receive Obama ads while visiting any of the countless sites in those networks, because they visited the campaign site. Display ads and large ad takeovers appeared on liberal sites like DailyKos, Democratic Underground, and Wonkette, as supporters of Democrats and related causes were served Facebook ads asking "Are You In?" Paid advertising is a proven way to acquire new donors and activists online. The best ads encourage engagement such as signing a petition, answering a quiz, or some reason to capture an address. Insider Information or Exclusive Access. Obama s campaign finance numbers were going to be big news. Obama s team knew that making donors and supporters the hero in this story was the right message. Supporters received a personalized from Obama s Campaign Manager, Jim Messina, in advance of releasing record breaking numbers to the press.

The video was also embedded on a personalized supporter page if you chose to view it online. Obama s Campaign Manager essentially gave a five minute investor report.

3 Video. The Obama campaign has always used video effectively and this second quarter campaign was no exception. The campaign embedded video of insider information in an sent to supporters in advance of public release of the FEC reports. The video was also embedded on a personalized supporter page if you chose to view it online. Obama s Campaign Manager essentially gave a five minute investor report. There were some celebratory remarks, but the campaign knew that media outlets would carry the monetary success message freeing Messina to treat supporters as investors and the hero of the success story. Video works because it connects us. Frequent Communication. The Obama campaign posts an average of two (2) tweets per day and 2-3 Facebook posts per day in addition to . Leading up to the campaign deadline of June 30 th, the campaign tweeted eleven (11) times on June 30 th alone. Eight (8) of the eleven (11) tweets were campaign goal updates. They posted on Facebook six (6) times. They weren t shy about communicating, especially the closer to the deadline they got because supporters are okay with more frequent communication when a topic is salient or relevant to them.

Make Donating Easy. Just like the big online retailers, Amazon, Zappos, and Apple, the one-page donation form has been streamlined and tested for maximum conversion.

You can increase your conversion rates by up to 30% with the right trust logos, like VeriSign, and the right color and language on your submit button, and the correct ask string.

4 Make Donating Easy. Just like the big online retailers, Amazon, Zappos, and Apple, the one-page donation form has been streamlined and tested for maximum conversion. Multivariate testing is easier now than ever to test form attributes to get the best response rates using Google Optimizer. If you haven t tested your donation forms, start tomorrow. You can increase your conversion rates by up to 30% with the right trust logos, like VeriSign, and the right color and language on your submit button, and the correct ask string. Look at the red action buttons on Obama s advertising. That button has clearly been tested. You don t have to be a billion dollar business or political campaign to see real results from multivariate testing. Celebrate. The Campaign tweeted 25 times on the FEC report release day of Jul % of those tweets were celebration data points. Sure, the campaign benefited from vast media coverage of the fundraising success so they could simply say Thank You via , Twitter and Facebook, and let the major networks and news outlets spend a 24 hour news cycle talking about the campaign s monetary success. So what if your nonprofit won t have this much coverage. Send several celebration communications from your executive, from a celebrity spokesperson, major donor, Board member(s), or beneficiary of your services. Any and all acknowledgements are absolutely appropriate and set you up for success in your next campaign. Your mission doesn t lend itself to a lot interim celebration? Then create some milestones to celebrate on the way to your ultimate goal.

5 Most important: Social media was a fully integrated communication channel, not treated as a standalone. All campaign messaging via , Website, Facebook, and Twitter communicated the same message, only adjusting length and call-to-action to fit the medium. There were nuanced differences between the ads on Facebook versus banner advertising, but the message was consistent. David Plouffe, the 2008 Obama campaign manager, reported that this consistent messaging strategy was key to 2008 s success. The campaign was diligent about consistent messaging with direct mail, telemarketing, media relations, , mobile, and social media and it looks like they are again on track to keep the message consistent regardless of the communication channel. You can do this today with every campaign. The consistent message, regardless of channel, infuses your communications with authenticity and drives your campaign message home. Advertisers and political campaigns have long known that too many messages will confuse. Stick to your campaign message early and often. Repeat. It s a limiting belief that just because you re not a political campaign, you can t achieve these same results. Obama s team had already started the next short-term campaign to support a National Day of Action before the second quarter fundraising campaign was over. You can too. Obama s next call-to-action wasn t as high profiles as the FEC reports, but as long as you re doing great work, jump right into your next campaign. Looking ahead. Obama for America used mobile pervasively in the 2008 election to sign up volunteers, promote voter registration, and keep supporters informed. FEC reports limited expenditures with OFA s mobile vendor, Mobile Commons, for mobile so far this year. Let s keep an eye out in the coming months to see how OFA uses mobile to engage and energize supporters. Maybe there s a mobile application on its way? Sources and References:

CORPORATE & ORGANIZATIONS Sweater Parties & Other Sweater Fundraising Events

GUIDE TO ONLINE FUNDRAISING FOR MAKE THE WORLD BETTER WITH A SWEATER CORPORATE & ORGANIZATIONS Sweater Parties & Other Sweater Fundraising Events Thank you for your interest in registering to start or