Online Video Ads … What’s Working?

October 31, 2007

Here's another one of those “blue plate specials” from Marketing Sherpa!

This time it's an excellent report on what's working and what's not with respect to online video ads. Available for free only through NOV 1.

Why does Marketing Sherpa expect a boom in online video ads?

1. Visual ad formats attract more consumer attention than static ones.

2. Consumers are lazy … they'd rather watch a 5-minute video than read through several web pages.

3. Ubiquity & familiarity breeds use … major sites like Google and Yahoo are about to deliver locally targetable video ads, which means video advertising will explode in scale. You'll soon see online video ads everywhere you turn.

Some tips from the report …

  • Don't imitate TV (or use existing TV spots) … viewers want a different experience online.
  • Test video and static display ad combos for maximum impact.
  • Experiment with various ad formats … the technology permits all sorts of presentations in and around, or incorporating, other content.
  • Think short … as in 5-10 seconds for the ad itself (not counting the content it's attached to or imbedded in).

But check it out by Nov 1!

Roger & Tom

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“Idol Gives Back” Starts Giving Back

October 30, 2007

Awhile back The Agitator applauded the “Idol Gives Back” extravaganza in which program sponsors and voting fans donated more than $75 million to fight illness and poverty in Africa.

Critics ranged from saying this project was simply promotional hype to arguing that the money given by fans was faux charity, since they were really paying to vote for an entertainer, with the cause being purely incidental.

To which we said cowpies!

We won't repeat our arguments here.

We simply want to point you to this International Herald Tribune article on where the donated funds are actually now flowing.

To groups you might have heard of — UNICEF, Malaria No More, Nothing But Nets, Save the Children, the Global Fund to Fights AIDS, TB and Malaria, and others — who are fighting specific diseases, helping victims of genocide, getting dropouts back in school and ameliorating poverty across a broad range of programs.

Are the “donors” of these funds really donors? While philanthropic scholars debate the issue, millions of lives are being improved … many outright saved.

That's good enough for us. Case closed.

Roger & Tom

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Please Take The Agitator Survey

October 27, 2007

We need your feedback!

Earlier this month, The Agitator passed an exciting milestone … we signed up subscriber #1,000. And the pace of sign-ups (we're now at 1,070) and visits to our blog is quickening.

As a group, our subs read almost 11,000 posts in the last thirty days. And, depending on which web analytics program we believe (!), another 2,000 to 6,000 unique visitors browse the site each month.

Since we started The Agitator, over 7,000 of our white papers and other resources have been downloaded by readers.

We're thrilled that The Agitator appears to be providing useful content to nonprofit fundraisers and communicators.

And we're prepared to put even more effort into providing a better and more valuable resource for our readers.

We ask only that you take a few moments to complete this reader survey, in which you can critique The Agitator and indicate the kind of topics and coverage you would find most useful in the future.

Only 12 questions to answer, taking just a few minutes.

We thank you for reading The Agitator. And special thanks to the many of you who have contributed ideas, content and comments.

We look forward to hearing from you.

And as dyed-in-the-wool direct marketers, we must emphasize …

TAKE THIS SURVEY NOW!

And don't forget to answer the question about your raise.

Roger & Tom

P.S. The two of us will be “retreating” the week of November 12. Please get your responses in by then. We'll be sharing the results with you.

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Do You Stand For Something

October 26, 2007

This is not a question. It's a fairly new blog from Cone, Inc. focused on cause-marketing … or what they call cause branding.

Either way, if you're thinking about associating your nonprofit or cause with a corporate partner (or vice versa), there's no better source of advice and insight than Cone. This blog opens the door to their 25+ years of experience in the field.

Founder Carol Cone, a social justice-inspired child of the 60's, started Cone in 1980. Her first cause branding project linked then-unknown Rockport footwear to the “cause” of walking for fitness and health. Rockport became The Walking Shoe Company. Since then, Cone has bonded dozens of corporations and causes in deeply authentic ways … from Reebok and human rights to Avon and breast cancer.

From a nonprofit's perspective, learning how to leverage the reach and visibility of socially-responsible businesses with integrity and impact, whether in a local community or globally, must be part of today's marketing equation.

Doyoustandforsomething.com provides an excellent resource for both novices and seasoned nonprofit marketers.

Check it out.

Roger & Tom

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Your Picture … Or Mine?

October 25, 2007

Haagan-Dazs had my picture on the wall when they were “visioning” this product. Or was it yours?!

Do you have a picture of your archetypal donor or activist on your wall? Do you imagine that picture changing over the next ten years. How? Or into whom? Will it change because of something you and your organization are consciously doing or intend to do? Or because of “exogenous factors?”

Do you think you need to do anything about it now?

Tom

Thanks to Seth Godin's blog for introducing me to this fabulous product!

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3 Examples of How The Web Should Work

October 24, 2007

Call me old-fashioned, but I'm getting tired of hearing about how many Facebook friends my third cousin Hortense, or Crest toothpaste, or Barack Obama has.

Here are three examples of really good informative use of the web.

1. health08.org — the Kaiser Family Foundation website that tracks and analyzes everything the presidential candidates say about health care issues. Plus plenty of context in the form of polling on health issues, breaking news and other third-party resources.

Particularly valuable is a tool that lets you build a chart giving detailed side-by-side analysis of the health care proposals of any four presidential candidates. The site also webcasts (then archives) one-hour interviews with each candidate on health care reform.

Boy, I can think of a dozen or so issue areas where I'd like to see this kind of well-chaperoned in-depth candidate coverage!

2. Ron Paul Fundraising — talk about transparency. Here's a candidate providing real-time (like in minute-by-minute) reporting of his campaign fundraising progress. No quarterly report spin here. Watch the Republicans' hottest online fundraising candidate pull his bucks in. After all, money — not Facebook friends — is the mother's milk of politics.

3. Environmental Defense Planned Giving — bequests and charitable gift annuities are about as far down on the hot topics spectrum as you can get, but here's a terrific example of how to present this information to your prospective donors online. Organized both by common giving scenarios and the usual gift types, this site manages to make the complexity go away … removing a major barrier for donors quietly checking out their options. A gift calculator tool and planned gift comparison chart are included. I like the donor profiles that nicely reinforce a prospect's initial urge to investigate.

Each of these is an example of the web adding real value in the form of information and understanding. And that's what it's there for!

Tom

P.S. Check out more good examples of web/online initiatives here, as cited here by Convio. I'm not plugging Convio … each of the organizations they have just awarded has come up with an innovative application or initiative that is well worth your attention, platform aside.

Posted by admin | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, online advocacy, online fundraising, planned giving, politics | Leave a Comment 

Tapping Your Supporters’ Passion

October 23, 2007

People with a cause are people with passion. And guess what? They're pretty creative too … as Psoriasis Cure Now has proven.

PCN has sponsored a video contest, asking its supporters to produce short videos designed to alert and engage the public about a disease that affects 7.5 million Americans. PCN spent about $15K on the project, including $7,500 to be awarded to the grand prize winner.

60 videos were submitted, and nine finalists selected. You can see them all here. You can still offer your pick till the end of October.

Did PCN get their money's worth? Absolutely!

Some of the videos might air as PSAs on television. Others will be screened for Congressional staff. Others will be used on their website and for online viral communications.

Says Mike Paranzino of Psoriasis Cure Now:

“Our finalists include videos made by a chiropractor from Nebraska and a civilian contractor to the Army Corps of Engineers … That they can do this in their spare time with retail equipment is astounding! It won't put the pros out of business but it will change the economics for all but the biggest players.”

To that we'd add … think of how energized other supporters of Psoriasis Cure Now will be to see the passion, creativity and commitmentof their compatriots.

This initiative is a winner in all respects. All the more impressive because we're not dealing with a “hot headline” issue here.

Roger & Tom

P.S. We were asked for our choice for Best Video. And we managed to disagree … Roger likes the straightforward approach of Mark Whele, who shows the unwanted attention that psoriasis sufferers receive, but delivers a hopeful message. A classic PSA approach. Tom, thinking more in terms of viral distribution, likes Preston Jones, who delivers a Rodney Dangerfield-like spoof with a message … psoriasis snubbed. We do agree that humor does trump on the viral marketing circuit. “Runner-up” Jennifer Fitzgerald also uses humor effectively to engage her viewer yet deliver a serious message.

Posted by admin | Filed Under Pushing the Creative Envelope, online activism, online fundraising, online video | Leave a Comment 

Tell Us How To Improve!

October 19, 2007

Earlier this month, The Agitator passed an exciting milestone … we signed up subscriber #1,000. And the pace of sign-ups (we're now at 1,049) and visits to our blog is quickening.

As a group, our subs read almost 11,000 posts in the last thirty days. And, depending on which web analytics program we believe (!), another 2,000 to 6,000 unique visitors browse the site each month.

Since we started The Agitator, over 7,000 of our white papers and other resources have been downloaded by readers.

We're thrilled that The Agitator appears to be providing useful content to nonprofit fundraisers and communicators.

And we're prepared to put even more effort into providing a better and more valuable resource for our readers.

We ask only that you take a few moments to complete this reader survey, in which you can critique The Agitator and indicate the kind of topics and coverage you would find most useful in the future.

Only 12 questions to answer, taking just a few minutes.

We thank you for reading The Agitator. And special thanks to the many of you who have contributed ideas, content and comments.

We look forward to hearing from you.

And as dyed-in-the-wool direct marketers, we must emphasize …

TAKE THIS SURVEY NOW!

And don't forget to answer the question about your raise.

Roger & Tom

P.S. The two of us will be “retreating” the week of November 12. Please get your responses in by then. We'll be sharing the results with you.

Posted by admin | Filed Under You Deserve a Raise, fun, research | Leave a Comment 

Convio Delivers

October 18, 2007

Convio has just announced a package of product innovations that even I, or better still, your CEO can appreciate.

Three things a nonprofit CEO worries about are: 1) recruiting more supporters within existing marketing budgets; 2) depending upon patchwork database integration schemes that carry great inefficiency costs (and data integrity/security risks); and 3) keeping pace with technology developments that might significantly change how their organization engages and leverages its constituency.

The “Convio Open” package addresses these inter-related worries.

Traditionally, groups have struggled with the most elementary challenges of building a comprehensive and actionable profile of individual donors — often using different database tools and schemes for mass marketing versus high dollar donor management. Then different databases for direct mail/telemarketing versus online marketing and record-keeping. Then throw in a different financial accounting and budgeting system for good measure.

Now, with many nonprofits experimenting with Web 2.0 social networking sites like Facebook to leverage the missionary (i.e., viral marketing) potential of existing supporters, the requirements for data integration and donor relationship management are becoming even more complex. These sites potentially generate an entirely different flow of supporter data.

Here's where you can see Convio's new suite of tools and applications to address these issues … database “Connector” tools for applications like salesforce.com, Raiser's Edge and Team Approach, among others … Extensions to permit leveraging of platforms like Facebook, Flickr, Plaxo, MySpace, YouTube and others.

Looks impressive. Check it out.

Tom

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9 Mistakes To Avoid In Online Campaign Landing Pages

October 17, 2007

Here from Performancing.com is a good list of mistakes to avoid in building effective landing pages for your online fundraising and advocacy campaigns. Details at source.

1. Mismatching URL and page topic to user inquiry

2. Below the fold call to action

3. Collecting unnecessary information

4. No testimonials

5. Too many calls to action … to many choices

6. Pay-per-click ads not actually directed to primary conversion page

7. Call to action not distinguished or obvious

8. Using Flash, video or other “plug-in required” design elements

9. Being too cheap with Pay-per-click placements to target optimal terms

And don't forget, a number of these elements lend themselves to testing.

Tom

Posted by admin | Filed Under General Post, email marketing, online advocacy, online fundraising | Leave a Comment 

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