Advocacy Avenue

offline communications ~ traditional online advocacy ~ social media

Spawning New Windows is Bad! Bad! Bad!

by Kevin Reid | August 25th, 2010

It still amazes me every time we do user testing on a website. Sometimes it’s funny. Sometimes it’s sobering. But, for the most part, it’s educational and valuable. Watching someone use the site you’ve created is one of the most enlightening things you can do. The site either does its job, or it doesn’t. And, you can typically find the spot where everything falls apart.

One of the behaviors I have noticed over and over again is the confusion created for some people when a link opens up a new window. While the purpose of the new window is typically to make sure the site visitor can easily return to the site, for less savvy web users it does the complete opposite. Suddenly, the back button doesn’t work. They don’t know why. They have a really hard time finding the site again.

Bad! Bad! Bad!

Paraphrasing Steve Krug, don’t make them think.

If you want people to stay on your site, give them something to stick around for. Don’t open up new windows. Tech newbies will be confused by it and tech superstars will scoff at your attempt to keep their attention.

What do you think? Are you passionate about spawning new windows or eradicating them from the face of the earth?

Posted in Design, Websites | No Comments »

When is the best time to begin prepping for year-end fundraising? Here’s a hint: it’s now.

by Dionna Humphrey | August 4th, 2010

Last month my email box was overwhelmed by various stores advertising ‘Christmas in July’ sales. Believe it or not, this is an actual ‘holiday’. Look it up (after reading this post, of course), there’s a Wikipedia entry explaining the history behind Christmas in July. Retailers are using this event not only in an attempt to entice you with deals to spend your money now, but also to prep you for shopping for the holidays.

Should your fundraising program do the same? You bet.

Most organizations have different levels of supporters in their system: the never-give, the sometimes-give, the always-give, and the give-because-its-tax-deductible. But EACH of these people needs to be sold on what you’re offering. And if you wait until November to get your ducks in a row, you may fall short of your fundraising goals.

In an ideal world, you are asking for donations throughout the year. But it’s year-end fundraising where organizations get the biggest bang for their online fundraising buck. And planning a successful year-end fundraising campaign takes, well, planning. Have you analyzed the data to determine how are your members responding to your messages throughout the year? What’s your open rate like these days? What issues are your members responding to in a way that generates donations? It’s important to begin evaluating these, and other variables over the next few weeks. The more you understand your current and potential donors, the better your outcome will be…not just this year but in years to come.

Don’t reach for your stress ball just yet! You still have time to have an incredible year-end giving campaign. Here are some things to add to your fundraising to-do list:

• If you don’t have a clear and easy way on your website to give, do it and do it now! If supporters can’t find an easy way to give money, they will likely bail.
• Remember to say ‘thank you’. How you thank your supporters makes a difference. And be sure to customize your auto response thank you’s so that your autoresponse doesn’t sound like an autoresponse.
• Make sure your website reflects why people should give. If you don’t make the case, people won’t respond to your ask.
• Shape up your donation form. Keep it short and make sure you are asking relevant information.
• Keep your supporters up to date. You don’t always have to ask them for something. Use your email marketing tools to keep them up to date on what the organization is working on. Have a victory? Shout it to the rooftops. A set back? Let them know its not over. This will help not only reinforce that they are a part of this movement you are creating, but it will also let them know their donations are being put to good use.

Don’t be intimidated by the prospect of fundraising. With the right tools and message you can have a great fundraising year. Stay tuned for next month’s post when I’ll tackle some quick fixes to your website to help maximize your effectiveness. To find out more about how Amplify Public Affairs can help you with your fundraising needs, please call us at 202.263.2900

Posted in Fundraising | No Comments »

Why I believe in documentation

by Jennifer Berk | July 30th, 2010

Today is my last day at Amplify, after almost three years of being the Internet team’s programmer, the company’s marketing point person, and a client/project manager. I’ve worked on exciting projects, with thoughtful and engaged clients, about issues I believe should get as much attention as we can possibly bring to them. My amazing colleagues are now continuing that work.

My last job is to make sure all those projects continue as smoothly as possible.

I believe in documentation because me-six-months-from-now doesn’t know what I know. And now, all the documentation I’ve written over the last three years can be useful to my colleagues. The team can back each other up, because I’ve made spaces for others to create documentation as well. That increase in our collective capability is the thing I’m most proud of at Amplify.

Last week, Debbie Weil’s Sweets and Tweets (one of the many great after-work DC politics/technology/social media events – the only one with cupcakes) featured several of us talking about the idea of linchpins, people who can make an enormous difference in their organizations: I talked about not waiting for assignments, about documentation, and about growing into new roles. I’m deeply grateful Amplify gave me the chance to grow and learn as I have.

I hope you’ll keep in touch, and I’ll be trying to blog regularly from business school at my personal blog, Information Squid. Schools are starting to think about social media and brand evangelism and all the areas Amplify works in (NYTimes, BusinessWeek), and I’m looking forward to connecting more traditional areas with that mindset.

Posted in Uncategorized | No Comments »

Why popularity matters…in Facebook ads, that is

by Elena Berger | July 23rd, 2010

In a recent post on e.politics, Colin Delaney outlines a potential pitfall in Facebook’s ad model that some advertisers may not know about: namely that Facebook charges more per click if an ad is underperforming, and skews cheaper if an ad is doing well.

Though you might cry foul (or FAIL!), this cost-per-click model is really nothing new. Google Adwords works the same way. The lower your ad quality is calculated to be, the more you’ll see your investment affected by higher costs per click. Ad quality may be determined by several factors, including whether users view your ad as relevent to their search. In this way, the system pretty much punishes you for not thinking about and A/B testing for variables like audience, keywords and copy.

Back to Facebook. In Colin’s example of a recent ad campaign, he saw the most clever and creative ads do badly and therefore cost more, while the more generic ads skyrocketed. This is another bizarre and often frustrating fact about advertising. What YOU think is a good ad may not actually translate to the average user. Why this is true we may never know. But this is why we always say TEST, TEST, TEST. Create a spectrum of ad copy running from bland to snarky. Choose a variety of images – including ones you wouldn’t click on yourself…because the people you want to reach are not you.

And here’s my most important advice for someone about to test Facebook ads: separate your ads into individual campaigns. Why? If you have one ad in particular that is doing terribly, it will bring your campaign’s average click-through rate down, and your high-performing ads may suffer the consequences. So different ads and different target settings get split into different campaigns, to save your good ads the embarrassment of being seen with their less popular counterparts.

It’s a harsh truth, but in this case, popularity wins every time. Is it so far off-base to call your most winning ads your “cheerleaders”?

Posted in Advertising, Marketing, Social Media | No Comments »

Facebook By The Numbers: The Congressional Leadership

by Kevin Reid | July 20th, 2010

After doing a quick tally of Facebook stats for the top Congressional leaders, I have two things to say: #1) someone at Congressman Boehner’s office is doing something right (although keep reading… there is room for improvement) and #2) WTF? Is this really the best Congress can do?

While the Facebook pages of political superstars like Obama and Palin have larger followings than most major newspapers in this country, the other household names within the political universe barely register on the scale. The lone wolf is Rep. John Boehner, the Republican Leader, who is way ahead of the pack with over 100,000 followers compared to Pelosi’s 20,000. Reid, Hoyer and McConnell are left in the dust.

Facebook Counts for Congressional Leaders

Scratching a little further, the numbers change things around. While there is nothing wrong with a lot of followers, another key metric – engagement – tells a slightly different story.

Reid has posted 54 updates to his page this month. McConnell has posted 24 updates. Boehner has posted five. Hoyer has posted three. The Speaker has only posted one! So, Reid is updating his followers about 3 times a day on average while Pelosi is updating her followers once every two weeks. Everyone else is somewhere in between.

Ha! But, Reid is being sneaky… he has hired someone who knows what an RSS feed is and is actually just having blog posts from his campaign site reposted on his Facebook page. “Cheater!” you say. Not so fast. By using technology to distribute his posts beyond his campaign website, he is being smart. He is simply using one of his networks to get his message out. He is sharing. He is being social.

But guess what? Boehner has a blog. Pelosi has a blog. Hoyer has a blog. Why aren’t they republishing their blog posts on Facebook? (And, yes… I did check and those blogs are official blogs, not campaign blogs.) Somebody get on the phone and give them a call!

And, what about McConnell? It looks like he had an active blog for the 2008 election, but hasn’t updated it since. That’s OK. He’s on YouTube and posts his videos to his Facebook page. In fact, he has posted something to his Facebook page 24 times so far this month. And, these are not RSS generated re-posts of content. These are real status updates and comments. So, of all of them, McConnell’s Facebook page is probably the most genuine.

In my opinion, Boehner and Reid are performing the best out of the bunch even though there is room for improvement. But, with a little effort, Pelosi, Hoyer and McConnell could easily jump to the front of the line. I will check back in a month and let everyone know. But, in the meantime, I will start looking at the Twitter accounts.

For more on this, see also “Capitol Hill Democrats and Social Media: The Sky is Not Falling,” on epolitics.com

[Note: Steny Hoyer has a personal page, a politician page and a “government official” page. I used the government official page (which has the lowest number of followers) because it seems to be the most active (his politician page hasn’t been updated since February).]

Tags: Boehner, Congress, facebook, Hoyer, McConnell, Pelosi, Reid, RSS, senate, US House of Representatives
Posted in Politics, Recent Trends, Social Media | No Comments »

Content is the new (and forever) black

by Elena Berger | June 24th, 2010

Yesterday, I had the pleasure of speaking on a panel at a meeting of the Web Content Mavens, a DC networking group focused on web content from many different perspectives. This particular event was a casual overview of web specialties. The discussion revolved around our various web-related job titles, what they mean in real life, and how they integrate with the tasks of the (mostly) content managers and online editors in the audience. The panel talked about everything from user experience and information architecture to social media and communications planning.

The funny thing is, talking about all of our specialties eventually brought us around to a fundamental truth about the online world: As fancy as organizations are now getting, and as many bells and whistles as they are adding to their repetoir, great content is and always will be the core of a great web presence.

Take a website like World Wildlife Foundation (not an Amplify client – I just like their site!). During a time when there are so many issues at play in environmetal news, they manage to promote all of their work and still produce important and well-written content about the Gulf oil spill. Their readers get immediate access to:

up-to-date news about the oil spill
information about how they can help WWF take action
first-hand accounts from organization representatives reporting from the front lines

The updates are timely, and the first person narratives capture the situation in a way that is different from other sources. You can also get great – and somewhat different, for a different audience – information from their Facebook page.

So besides having an attractive site that allows people to find all the things they’re looking for, it’s really their well-written, thoughtfully considered content that sets them apart. In the advocacy world, this is the most basic, crucial thing for you to get right. And all the other stuff – from search engine optimization to Twitter feeds and everything in between – need to be an extension of your great content in order to be truly meaningful.

When I say that content is basic, however, I don’t at all mean that it’s easy. Understanding your audience and finding your voice can be the most difficult things in the world to do, and shouldn’t be taken lightly. That’s why when Amplify’s clients come to us for special projects – ad campaigns, advocacy microsites, social media, videos, etc. – we very often ask them to take a step back with us and first consider what’s already on their site.

By the way, hooray for meetups like the Web Content Mavens for keeping the important stuff in the spotlight.

Posted in Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

Drupal: The user-friendly CMS

by Alison McCauley | May 27th, 2010

No, seriously!

Sure, one of the biggest reasons the Drupal CMS is popular among smaller organizations is the very attractive ($0.00) price tag. But a less obvious strength of this platform is also one that makes it an even more cost-effective choice: A well-built Drupal website can be superior in both functionality and usability for day-to-day content managers.

That’s right, organizations can have powerful, feature-rich websites, without needing advanced webmasters on staff for everyday site updates.

The key is Drupal’s almost limitless flexibility. The users and developers in the Drupal community have built an extensive collection of contributed (non-core) modules, all of which were created to meet needs, solve problems — even address pet peeves.

Website builders can achieve back-end user-friendliness, without sacrificing functionality, by taking advantage of a number of contributed modules that facilitate customization of workflows and interfaces. Here are some of my favorites:

Create an additional or alternate content administration page with Views Bulk Operations, an extension to the all-powerful Views module. With VBO, you can provide a simpler, more functional interface for managing the site’s content.
With Node Convert, content admins can convert nodes to and from any content type. The process can be even smoother if you set up Node Convert Templates — which also help ensure the safe transfer of any custom content (CCK) fields.
Make content entry a little less tedious — and a little more standardized, in some cases — with Node Clone (works just like it sounds: create a new node by copying an existing one).
Improve the node adding/editing interface with any of the following modules:
- Save and Edit: Adds a “Save and Edit” button to node forms (to apply and save changes without leaving the node-edit form), along with an option to have nodes not be published when “Save and Edit” is used (in which case a “Publish” or “Save and Publish” button can be added)
- Node and Comments Form Settings: Options for hiding and configuring various elements of node and comment forms (i.e. hiding the Input Format and “Split summary at cursor” fields), plus the added feature of a “Cancel” button for node forms.
- Workflow: Allows for setting up multiple, custom workflows for node types — for example, a workflow could move users through the Draft, Reviewed, and Published “workflow states” for a Press Release node type. Additionally, each stage of a workflow can trigger specific actions, like an email being sent to a content administrator or a message being displayed to the current user.

If you build or manage a Drupal website, what other features should be on this list?

Whichever platform you use, think about your website’s back-end usability — what do you really like about your CMS, and what makes you want to throw your computer out the window?

Tags: CMS, Drupal, usability, web development
Posted in Websites | No Comments »

Crisis management, White House style: publicizing oil spill efforts

by Jennifer Berk | May 17th, 2010

McClatchy has a fascinating and comprehensive description of the White House’s messaging efforts around the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico.

Within hours, it was cranking out a sustained barrage across the broad spectrum of modern media — statements, reports, e-mails, tweets, photos and videos — all punctuated by a high-profile presidential visit to the Gulf followed by an incendiary speech at the White House and a video recap with exclusive behind-the-scenes views of Obama in “West Wing Week,” the White House’s new online program at www.whitehouse.gov.

I’d noticed the White House’s long timeline blog post earlier, “The Ongoing Administration-Wide Response to the Deepwater BP Oil Spill”. It starts with Search and Rescue, goes on to The President is Alerted, and lists Assets Deployed To Date starting the night of April 20th and continuing every day since. They’re continuing to update the timeline with every day’s five to ten actions, and its length at this point is awe-inspiring.

Most importantly, their publication schedule is reaching the media: the day after the timeline was first published, Politico had an item headlined Disaster in the print edition that started with Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN), the House Republican Conference Chairman, saying the government didn’t react quickly enough to the oil leak. But at the bottom, it mentioned the “6,300-word opus” posted by the White House.

McClatchy’s article ends with Dan Pfeiffer, White House communications director, saying “”We were successful at getting a pretty high percentage of the coverage accurately depicting the steps the administration had taken . . . . It was not clear that was going to happen (several) days ago.”

Impressive results for a crisis communication plan, in the wake of an environmental disaster that will continue to affect us for years. Hopefully the management of the leak will have positive results soon as well….

Tags: bp, crisis communications, crisis response, deepwater, obama, oil leak, white house
Posted in Blogging, Politics, Public Relations, Social Media, Video | No Comments »