member engagement with online advocacy communities hl webinar
TRANSCRIPT
Slide 1
Member Engagement with Online
Advocacy Communities
Best Practices for Legislative
Action Centers
#advocacy2015
Slide 2
Presented by
#advocacy2015
Andy Steggles
President & Chief Customer Officer Andy is a frequent thought leader and keynote speaker at conferences and events, traveling the globe to educate professionals about the importance of collaborative software, the cloud and the impact technology makes on the community it serves.www.higherlogic.com
Carole Mahoney
Sales & Marketing ConsultantWith over ten years of experience as a digital strategist and practitioner for technology businesses in both the for profit and for purpose (not profit) sectors, Carole helps associations apply the inbound engagement principles to grassroots advocacy for Votility.
www.votility.com
Slide 3
Agenda
Housekeeping
Introduction
Creating the grassroots advocacy strategy
Implementing the strategy
Getting members to join your legislative action center
Live example
Your questions
Additional resources & next steps
#advocacy2015
Slide 4
Introduction
#advocacy2015
People trust their orgs more than congress! They want to engage in advocacy!
Slide 5
Creating the (Advocacy) Strategy
#advocacy2015
What are the goals, objectives, outputs/strategies & related planned advocacy activities? How does that align to your brand, mission, and member’s goals? How does the legislative action center, or online advocacy community, need to be set up and what resources are available?
Slide 6
Goals
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• How does it align with your mission and
business goals?
• Who is the audience and how does it
align to their goals?
• Do you want to:
• impact legislation to increase
funding, pass a bill or act, or repeal a
bill or act?
• educate only and not take a
stance?
• Inform and shape opinion on pending
or proposed legislation?
• Build a list of supporters for future
action?
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Criteria
#advocacy2015
• Does this impact the core
mission and primary
stakeholders?
• Are there other organizations
this is closer to?
• Leave personal politics out,
match with business goals.
• What are the key success
metrics for community
engagement and grassroots
results?
Give example. Medicare/Medicaid company.
Slide 8
Research, Track, Monitor
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• What legislation is out there?
• How do we determine our
position?
• Who is in opposition? Why?
• Who is an ally? Why?
• Who is affected? Why?
• Ask the community.
• Listen to the community.
Slide 9
Resources
#advocacy2015
• People
• CONTENT
• Technology
• Financial
•People • Direct lobbying • Grasstops (high quality influence) • Grassroots (high quantity influencers)
• CONTENT •Video •Blogs/articles •Reports •Images •Recordings/Podcasts
• Technology • Legislative Tracking System • Online Community Platform
• Grassroots Advocacy Platform • CRM or AMS
• Financial • PAC? • Fundraising?
Slide 10
Messaging
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Qualitative
Quantitative
• What?
• Who?
• Why?
• When?
• Where?
• How?
What do you want them to do? What content are you giving them to compel them to take action? Who are they, what do they care about? When do they need to take action? Where? How? This is going to touch every part of your advocacy campaign. So spend time to develop your messaging. Remember, not all messaging works for all audiences. So know your audiences and prepare appropriate messaging. Be able to frame your issue in both a quantitative and qualitative message. Use big picture data and statistics (macro) but be able to also tell personal stories (micro)
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Communication Plan
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Use an alert system
Internal (training)
External (campaigns)
Slide 12
Implementing the strategy
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Technology and people
The right technology in the hands of the right people.
Slide 13
Getting members to join
#advocacy2015
Website as the
centralized location for
Inbound activities
• Email campaigns
• Social media
• Blogs
• Live Events
Count the clicks.
Slide 14
Social Media
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• 2 way communication
• Automated and real time
• Gauge sentiment
• Short attention spans
• Cocktail party rule
• Evaluate often, apply to general
messaging.
Tools like Hootsuite help monitor and automate. Not just for promotion, but also for interaction and gauging sentiment. Enable advocates to share on social media with you, each other, and their legislators.
Slide 15
#advocacy2015
• SEGMENT!
• Opt in only.
• 50 characters or less subject
line.
• 1-2 sentence intro
• Bullet points
• Repeat Call to Action
• Mobile friendly
• Consistent
Educate and engage members to take action on the landing pages. Make it easy for members to engage with legislators through email. Guide them.
Slide 16
Content
#advocacy2015
• Educational blogs & articles with
supporting third party data.
• Visual info graphics
• 90 second personal and
emotional video
• Reports that don’t bore or
overwhelm
• Style to match audience
IPCR website
Slide 17
Events
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• Grassroots events-
“flash mobs”
• Press conferences
• Site visits
• Build and maintain
momentum before and
after through social.
Slide 18
Legislative Action Center
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If they have joined more than one issue or state, it will show in their individual home page.
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Legislative Action Center
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Let’s say federal education is an important issue. You can create a section for the issue where members can discuss with one another, access and add to the library of resources, share their stories with the world. See what the calendar of events around this issue are, see who their fellow supporters are and interact with them directly, and take action to contact Their legislator on a bill that is up for a vote.
Slide 20
Legislative Action Center
#advocacy2015
Members can also join the community for their state and do the same things there that they can do on a federal issue.
Slide 21
Legislative Action Center
#advocacy2015
Members can also join the community for their state and do the same things there that they can do on a federal issue.
Slide 22
Legislative Action Center
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They can have discussions with the whole group…
Slide 23
Legislative Action Center
#advocacy2015
Have all your educational resources in one place where they can download and sort
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Legislative Action Center
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They can share their stories and thoughts on the issue with the whole world
Slide 25
Legislative Action Center
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They can interact privately with other members
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Legislative Action Center
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Take action right within the community
Slide 27
Additional Resources
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Sent in a follow up email; Member engagement eBook Community Blueprint guide Link to personalized demo request
Slide 28
Questions
#advocacy2015
?
IPCR website