2008 eNonprofit Benchmarks Study

Presented by

Sarah DiJulio, M+R

Karen Matheson, M+R

Steve Daigneault, Amnesty International

Mathew Grimm, Environmental Defense Fund

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INTRODUCTIONS

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Methodology

• 21 Major Nonprofit Organizationso Civil/Legal Rights

o Environmental

o International

o Health

• January 2006 – December 2007 Datao 12,000 Email Messages

o 6.5 Million Subscribers

o 14 Million Email Advocacy Actions

o $100 Million Dollars in Online Donations

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KEY FINDINGS

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POSSIBLE FACTORS

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DIGGING DEEPER

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2007 NUMBER OF ONLINE GIFTS BY GIFT SIZE

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2007 AMOUNT RAISED ONLINE BY GIFT SIZE

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2007 ACTION TAKERS vs. ACTIONS TAKEN

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ENVIRONMENTAL DEFENSE

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EDF’s Use of Benchmarks

• Our open and click rates have declined sharply in the past year

• Problem with our messaging?• Benchmarks are vital in putting our efforts into

perspective• We’re not experiencing anything that others aren’t

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Year-end Testing: Why Do It?

• 40% of online dollars come during December. Perfect time to test.

• 55% of those dollars come via EDF.org website – many prompted by our email

• Two previous December tests showed that those getting fewer messages gave at statistically the same rate as those getting more messages.

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Year-end Message Quantity Test

A random 15% of the list

received only the three messages in red. The rest

of the list received the full compliment of

messages listed to the left.

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Year-end Message QuantityTest Results

• Those that received fewer messages had a 0.59% giving rate over the course of the campaign.

• The others gave at a rate of 0.91%. So much for the previous findings?

• Further tests will be structured to find the “sweet spot” between 3 and 13 messages!

• Why take the time and effort to message unnecessarily, risking unsubscribes when you don’t have to?

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Year-end Homepage Test Results

• Donation form won - brought in 8% more gifts (number of gifts)

• Raised 8% more dollars in donations $1,000 and under

• Raised 10% more dollars in donations $500 and under

• Did not hinder homepage interaction – bounce rate for the homepage stayed relatively unchanged

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AMNESTY INTERNATIONAL

We Publish Our Stats• We send meaningful stats to all staff and provide analysis to

encourage them to focus on:

– List growth: requires extraordinary efforts (paid marketing, SEO)– Current events and personal stories: actions perform better w/

either element– Syndication: web traffic and RSS feeds are email alternatives– Search rankings: dependent on good writing– Fundraising: everyone contributes to our fundraising success

• By publishing comprehensive meaningful stats for the entire organization, we spark curiosity and competition among staff.

Action Web Confirmation

• By comparing ourselves to other NGOs, we get good ideas to test.

• Changing the web confirmation to donation form raised $46,000+ since December and tells us which issue inspires donors.

• Top issues: torture, Tibet, Darfur.– Our Tibet action went to 450K+ and raised $15K+ via

the web confirmation donation page.• Loser issue: death penalty

– Best performing action in Feb., raised $0.

EXAMPLE ANALYSIS SENT TO STAFF:

Fundraising: - We continue to monitor actions that inspire our activists to donate. Darfur consistently tops the list of actions garnering the most donations. This month, the Shi Tao action and war on terror related actions also performed well. The death penalty, although it brought in the most actions, did not prompt people to give. We’ve seen similar results in direct mail.

Multivariate testing

• Make the most of your web traffic by testing variations of your design.

• Tiny changes can have profound affects.• Doesn’t require you to use precious email

capital and improves overall usability of your website

• Improved usability leads to greater confidence in your organization and less frustrated supporters

Big red button

• By changing the standard grey “submit” on our donation form to a large red “submit”, we got a 29% lift in our conversion rate.

Utility nav tweak

• changing the order of the utility nav items and changing “donate” to a bold, green “donate now” provided a:– 70% lift in overall traffic to the donation form– 83% lift in total $ raised

Right pointing arrows

• Adding some right pointing arrows to the word “Donate” on our homepage donate button provided a: – 5% lift in overall traffic to the donation form– 55% lift in total $ raised

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However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results.

Winston Churchill

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Q + A