Final report for Cooperative Extension project to promote saving and the America Saves program.

1. America Saves Week 2015 Mini-Grant-FINAL Report
eXtension Financial Security for All Community of Practice
Submitted by Dr. Barbara O’Neill, CFP®, Rutgers University, oneill@aesop.rutgers.edu
Below is a description of the outcomes for five project deliverables in our 2015 mini-grant application:
Development and Delivery of a New eXtension Webinar- The webinar Calculating What to Save for Retirement was presented live
on February 3 (see https://learn.extension.org/events/1716) and has been archived in YouTube for viewing by anyone worldwide (see
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwSqjRWCW0E&feature=youtu.be). A total of 126 people attended the live webinar. A follow-
up evaluation indicated that 98% of respondents would recommend the webinar and planned to apply its information to their work. A
representative comment was “The info from this webinar dovetails perfectly with what my clients need from financial coaching.”
Marketing of 2014 Webinar Links- Social media messages and announcements at meetings were used to drive traffic to two
webinars about saving that first aired in 2014: Saving Money: Strategies for Non-Savers archived on the eXtension Learn Web site at
https://learn.extension.org/events/1426 and Saving Money: Research Insights archived at https://learn.extension.org/events/1442.
Content Delivery via Twitter Chats- Dr. O’Neill participated in three twitter chats in February 2015 that, taken together, had more
than 10 million exposure impressions (i.e., total number of times that tweets are delivered to timelines, including repeats, based upon
the number of followers of chat participants). She participated as a guest tweeter on Wisebread’s #wbchat on February 19, 2015 with
over 6 million exposure impressions (see http://www.wisebread.com/saving-for-college-highlights-from-our-chat-with-dr-barbara-
oneill-from-rutgers) and as a Google hangout guest and live tweeter on Experian’s February 25, 2015 #creditchat archived at
http://www.experian.com/blogs/news/about/frugal-family/. In addition, she organized the February 24, 2015 #eXASchat with
eXtension and the University of FL, attended by 36 participants, to promote the America Saves Challenge. These events are archived
at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGi-ByaOp7Q and Storified at https://storify.com/RutgersNJAES/extension-america-saves-
chat-exaschat. All three Twitter chats stressed the importance of saving and offered practical advice on ways to free up money to save.
Promotion of Six Animated Videos- Six 2- to 3-minute animated videos feature avatar characters discussing America Saves and
saving money were promoted using social media messages posted on Twitter and Facebook. As of 3/10/15, the six videos have been
collectively viewed 877 times. They are housed on Dr. O’Neill’s YouTube page: http://www.youtube.com/user/moneytalkBMO.
Social Media Campaign- A total of 136 Cooperative Extension educators, America Saves campaign coordinators, and others
participated in the eXtension America Saves Week (ASW) social media outreach project. A total of 60 new Facebook posts and 60
new tweets were prepared in “cut and paste” format for distribution by project participants throughout February 2015. The messages
provided information about America Saves or some aspect of saving money or reducing debt and expenses.
The project employed a multiple methods (triangulation) evaluation with five metrics: 1. unique hashtag (#eXasw), 2. a follow-up
consumer survey, 3. a follow-up professional participant survey, 4. bit.ly analytics to determine clicks on links in messages, and 5.
tracking pre- and post-project Klout scores (a Twitter influence metric). It replicated the 2011-14 eXtension social media campaigns.
Two weeks after the end of ASW, 770 tweets were recorded with the hashtag, #eXasw, compared to 1,091 (2014), 1,503 (2013), 1,437
(2012) and 1,190 (2011). A Tweet Reach report, however, indicated a reach of 2,217 accounts. In addition, by March 10, 2015, a total
of 664 clicks from Facebook messages and tweets were recorded (compared to 1,277, 2,814, 1,550, and 602, respectively, in 2014/
2013/2012/2011). Two evaluation surveys were completed by followers/friends of project participants (via a link embedded in final
messages) and project participants themselves to gather feedback. Following is a brief description of results of these surveys:
Consumer (Followers/Friends) Survey Results- Of 18 respondents, 56% found the ASW messages very useful or useful (39%).
Additionally, 78% visited one or more of the ASW Web site links that were contained in the messages and 17% said they planned to.
With regard to joining America Saves, 11% of respondents reported that they did, 28% said that they planned to, 33% were already
American Savers, and 28% said they had not joined. Open-ended feedback suggested fewer hashtags and more videos and images.
Professional Collaborator Survey- Of the 136 project participants, 31 (22.8%) completed a post-ASW follow-up evaluation survey
The number of social media followers/friends reported by these professional collaborators ranged from 35 to 4,800 and totaled 15,111
versus 3,056 (2014), 4,045 (2013), 5,966 (2012) and 8,163 (2011). When the outreach numbers reported by all of the respondents
were combined, there was an average of 487 message recipients apiece versus 254 (2014), 192 (2013), 199 (2012) and 226 (2011).
Klout scores of the 16 respondents who reported them increased from before to after the project and respondents’ total average Klout
scores increased from 23.8 to 30.7 (versus 29.7 to 38.8 (2014), 32.6 to 39.6 (2013), 20.3 to 29.3 (2012), and 11.2 to 19.7 (2011). More
than 9 of 10 (94%) respondents said that they would participate in another social media financial education project and 52% reported
that they received direct messages, retweets, likes, comments, and /or shares in response to their messages. The following open-ended
feedback was received from survey respondents: “One person commented “Good information. We received many “likes.” “ I am a
member of our county-wide Chamber of Commerce and they retweeted several of the posts,” “ [Received]comments indicating
agreement with the message and anecdotal thoughts,” and “Most of my messages were retweeted.”