E-action Review and Practices Survey
Jess Day
www.advocacyonline.net www.fairsay.com linkedin.com/in/jessday
Version 1.1

E-action comparison
Summary online actions were defined as
Most organisations are offering web content which calls on the
actions which are easy-to-use, well
reader to do something
presented and easy to find. The
trend seems to be towards specific, using their computer,
straightforward actions to specific to further a political cause
targets, with fewer complicated
rich media interfaces.
We see more problems when
looking at the action in the context
of a supporter’s relationship with
the organisation – weak or
disjointed background info, thank
you pages and emails which waste
the opportunity to build a
relationship.
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 2

What is the e-action comparison?
Definition • Easy to find
A snapshot of online • Quality
campaigning (UK, Canada, • Content
International). 84 online • Background
actions carried out during
July/August 2009, reviewed • Ease of use
against a specific set of • Opt in
criteria. • Thank you page
• Thank you email
It looked at some points of fact • Follow up
- eg type of action, target etc,
and some subjective
assessments, eg easy to find,
relevant to campaign etc.
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 3

What it isn’t
• Confidential
• A list of the top e-actions
• An assessment of a campaign
• A website review
• A review of emailing programme
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 4

What are organisations doing?
• 64% of actions asked people to write/edit their own
message
• 26% were petitions
• Only 3 ‘enhanced’ petitions
• Quite a few ‘DIY’ actions (eg download a letter)
• Majority using email forms, half via a hosted system
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 5

Who is doing well?
• Size isn’t everything. Little correlation between turnover
and performance
• ‘Primary campaigners’ do better than other
organisations
• Environmental and international poverty organisations
performed strongest, Unions weakest
• Global organisations strongest, UK orgs performed
better than Canadian
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 6

What’s being done well?
• Easy to find - 58%
• Quality (relevance to campaign) - 52%
• Content/copy - 60%
• Ease of use - 60%
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 7

Weak areas
• Background - 43%
• Thank you page - 42%
• Thank you message - 26%
• Follow up communcation - 31%
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 8

Practices survey
Email is seen to be at the • “Consistently we find that
heart of successful e- email delivers the most
campaigning, with involvement actions”, (survey
in blogging and social respondent)
networking sites relatively
small. Many organisations are
struggling, though, with the
complexities of targeting and
tailoring communications for
their supporters.
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 9

About the survey
• 45 organisations - self-selected
• Confidential
• Mostly UK (33) and Canada (9)
• Carried out online June-Aug 2009
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 10

Email
• ‘Small’ campaigners likely to have more of their
campaigners online
• 49% are taking into account supporters’ previous
actions/preferences to inform emails
• 72% send single-message action alerts
• Only 3 split test emails
• 31% systematically ‘cleaning’ their list
• 33% have an email ‘welcome route’
• 9% have a strategy for ‘reactivating’ people who don’t
respond
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 11

Campaigning and fundraising
• 76% ask donors to take campaign action
• 69% ask campaigners to donate/subscribe
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 12

Online actions
• Most popular actions: email elected representative
(84%), email government (78%) and tell a friend
(76%)
• 73% are using hosted campaign services
• 11% use free services, eg ‘Write to them’
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 13

Blogs and social networks
• 31% using blogs to support campaigning
• 93% have a presence on a social networking site
• 38% engaging directly with supporters
• Facebook and twitter most popular
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 14

What does this mean for me?
Learning points • Jess Day
Contact me for your organisation’s e-campaigning consultant
e-action review results. • Jess@jess-day.co.uk
Benchmark yourself - review and
adapt the methodology to suit you.
(Contact me for tipsheet.)
Look at an action in the context of
the user’s experience. Some issues
will be harder or take longer to
change such as tailoring email
messages, but others, such as
thank you messages, just take a
little time and thought.
full report at: eCampaigningReview.com 15