Now General Electric has some proof.

In late 2011, the company compared the effectiveness of a paid advertising campaign and paid advertising campaign coupled with online-sharing.   Overall, consumers who saw the ad and received a referral from a friend were 138% more likely to view GE favorably than those who saw the ad alone.

The results of the test were originally published in the January 25th edition of Advertising Age.

“Personal referrals are far and away the most influential form of communications,” said Sparklight Communications President Joseph LaMountain.  “Yet many companies and causes fail to incorporate word-of-mouth into their marketing and communications campaigns.”

For example, organizations can raise significant levels of awareness, or funding, for an issue by asking its supporters to share  information to friends, neighbors and work colleagues.  Yet too often this valuable “human capital” is not effectively mobilized.

Many groups would like to have a “grasstops” network of volunteers – those with significant expertise and political connections – but few have successfully built one from scratch.

Late last year, we helped build a team of A-list volunteers for a national patient advocacy organization.  We recruited 78  volunteers from 43 states with significant health care and political experience.  Their goal is to deliver the organization’s message to key decision-makers in their state.

We focused on four things when building our Elite council.

1. Developing Application Criteria – We started by asking, “What do you want people to do?  What skills do they need? ” These questions formed our application.  We also asked, for example, how far applicants lived from their state capital.  That’s because we want them to meet with state officials, like the governor, so being close to the capital is key.  Diversity and educational attainment are also important, so we asked that too.  All told, our 20 questions were answerable in about 5 minutes.
2. Finding the Influentials – We also wanted applicants who are influential in their community.  So we asked a series of 12 questions modeled on those developed RoperASW research firm.  The questions are designed to identify the 10% of the people in a community that “convinces the remaining 90%” how to vote, shop and give.  By finding local connectors, we can work with their connections to reach public officials.
3. Looking Internally – Finally, we organized an internal recruitment campaign.  Our “concentric circles” strategy began by building a list of 250 names recommended by Board Members, staff and sponsors.  Friends of friends are easier to recruit, already know about you and help spread the word.  We then contacted our 3,500-strong advocacy mailing list.  So strong was the response, we never needed to contact our broader list of 250K supporters.
4. Picking up the Phone – Collecting applications online is fine.  But applications can look good on paper, but not in real life.  That’s why we personally interviewed every member before admitting them to the team.  A 15-minute phone call is all it took, and in addition to quality control, the calls established great rapport with staff from Day 1.

Over a five-week period we received 276 applications.  Of them, 90 were interviewed by telephone and 78 accepted into the program.  Now these 78 elite volunteers are beginning to engage with key decision-makers through the 2012 Presidential campaign.

Exciting stuff!

But we were even more excited by the quality of the volunteers joining the team  Among the 78 members from 43 states….

• 80% have a college degree (3x national avg.).
• 45% have a post-graduate degree (10x national avg.).
• 60% live within 75 miles of state capital; 40% live within 30 miles.
• 55% personally know a local, state or federal elected official(s).
• 90%+ were already involved as a grassroots volunteer.

We also succeeded in recruiting Influentials.  According to RoperASW, anyone answering “yes” to 3 or more of the 12 questions we posed is considered very influential in their community (top 10%).  Our elite volunteers answered, on average, “yes” to 9 of 12 questions.  Here’s a snapshot of their community connections:

• 84% have served on a local committee or board of directors.
• 83% have written a letter to the editor or called a live TV/radio show.
• 76% have made a donation to a political party or candidate.
• 71% have been interviewed on live TV or radio.
• 61% have participated in a Washington, DC lobby day.

While this approach was specifically developed for a network of political advocates, there could be many more applications.  For example, you could follow this model to recruit a Board of Birectors, Walk Coordinators, Research Ambassadors, Public Spokespersons and more.  Let us know if it works for you too!

Social Media Expert, Jason Falls

I try to read social media expert Jason Falls whenever I can squeeze in the time. He is a no-nonsense, data driven type who hits the nail on the head when it come to social media strategy. I hate bells and whistles. He hates bells and whistles.

This is why his article, Three Keys to Nonprofit Success in Social Media is still applicable today, despite the fact it was written THREE years ago.

The intro is a bit long, but his thesis is great. The keys are:

Have a compelling story to tell.
Make a specific ask or establish a specific goal to reach.
Make it astonishingly easy to give.

He also speaks about calls to action in content, the need for the emotional connection in your ask, as well as the critical need to have a strong communications plan around your giving goals. (Without this last one, Falls said, it’s like building a McDonald’s in the Sahara Desert. It’s certainly needed but no one will know about it! )

Here it is in its entirety. Happy reading!

Three Keys to Nonprofit Success in Social Media

I have a family history of alcoholism and in 2008 decided I wanted to stop drinking. But it was harder than I thought. So I decided to visit my primary care physician and she prescribed Lexapro, an anti-depressant medication. After one dose, I lost my craving for alcohol. After thirty days, I stopped taking it and haven’t had a drink since.

Good news, right? Not if you want to purchase health insurance on the open marketplace. When we gave up our group health coverage, our insurance company declined to cover me citing my past history of “substance abuse and anxiety.” Fortunately, I was able to continue coverage through COBRA temporarily; that company dropped me after a payment was 3 days late.

For the last 18 months I’ve been without any health insurance coverage. After much prodding, our health insurance company did eventually offer me a policy that cost $1,500 per month with a $10,000 out-of-pocket deductible. I declined, hoping that the health care reform law passed by Congress in 2010 would kick in before I suffered any grave medical problem.

And that’s exactly what happened. This summer, I learned about the Pre-existing Condition Insurance Plan (PCIP) that was created as part of the health care reform law. Organized by the states and federal government, it provides coverage to someone like me who’s had difficulty getting coverage in the past. It’s not free, but at $168 a month it’s affordable.

I’ve worked in health care for nearly 20 years. During that time I’d heard from many people with diabetes, epilepsy and cancer and the difficulties they’d faced in obtaining health insurance. But losing my health insurance because I stopped drinking alcohol? I never thought in a million years my life would be at risk for making the (seemingly) right decision about my personal health.

So the next time you hear people decry “Obamacare” and how it’s taking away your personal liberties, think again. You just may be in my shoes some day.

But I have learned a ton from this series and it is easy to use, and find key webinars, once you know where to look.

While it is mostly for ad campaigns and ad performance, it has other side benefits as well, especially when it comes to word usage, testing, and calls to action. See what you think and let me know.

http://www.facebook.com/adsmarketing/index.php?sk=webinarcenter

By Tim Hoover of the Denver Post….

Supporters of an initiative that would ask voters in November to raise taxes for education are using an online, grassroots strategy to gather signatures that could revolutionize the petition process.

“It is the first time that I have seen this kind of tactic,” said veteran ballot-issue consultant Rick Reiter. “I’m watching it closely because I could learn a lot.”

Great Education Colorado Action is the political arm of Great Education Colorado, a group that urges more spending on education, and it has sent e-mails to supporters and turned to social networking to jump-start a signature-gathering drive for Initiative 25.

That proposal would, for five years, raise state sales taxes from 2.9 percent to 3 percent and hike the state’s income tax from 4.63 percent to 5 percent. If voters approved it, the proposal would generate an estimated $3 billion for K-12 and higher education.

Supporters say the tax hikes are needed to offset three years of deep cuts to education spending.

Critics say Coloradans are in no mood for a tax increase and the proposal would kill jobs during an economic recovery. Republicans have been the most vocal critics, but many Democrats have been silent on the proposal, and Gov. John Hickenlooper, a Democrat, has repeatedly said Coloradans have “no appetite” for a tax increase.

The initiative filed by state Sen. Rollie Heath, D-Boulder, doesn’t have the support so far of the state’s major business or education groups. That means the six-figure sums that are usually required to hire companies to conduct petition drives may not be forthcoming.

So supporters are trying a strategy that uses social network websites to ask people to sign the petitions. Supporters have set up a website that allows people to download petitions and then volunteer to gather signatures.

The kit includes instructions on how to gather 50 signatures to fill each petition and even how to properly staple the pages. It instructs volunteers to seek out a notary after gathering the signatures and then to return the signed petitions to supporters in Denver.

Every petition must bear an individual number, and the website where they can be downloaded assigns each one a unique number.

“The conventional wisdom is you need a lot of money to get something on the ballot,” said Lisa Weil, spokeswoman for Great Education Colorado. “Well, we don’t have that. What we’ve got is tens of thousands of education supporters who care about schools and affordable higher education.”

Instead of standing outside a supermarket, Weil said, volunteers can seek signatures on a more personal level. This closer-knit connection also will allow volunteers to better educate others about funding cuts for schools and colleges.

The hurdle to get an initiative on the ballot isn’t small. Supporters will have to gather the valid signatures of 86,105 registered Colorado voters, a benchmark that usually means circulators aim for as many as twice that number of signatures just to be safe.

“I think that the structure of what they’re doing has potential here,” said Reiter, the consultant, “but like all these things, when you need 11,000 people engaged in it, the management and the direct contact with those people will dictate whether this works or not.”

He added: “Hopefully 11,000 people have staplers. Because if you don’t staple it right, you’re done.”

The activists spent most of Tuesday and Wednesday morning hanging from the 450-foot high smokestack, while painting the phrase “Quit Coal” in giant letters.  The eight were later arrested and charged with felony criminal damage to property.

Eight more Greenpeace activists worked to halt the approach of a coal barge at the city’s other major power plant. The activists dropped off a bridge near the Crawford coal plant, and unfurled a banner with “We Can Stop Coal” written in both English in Spanish.

While the scene was hectic at Fisk, it was nothing compared to the chaos at Crawford.  Traffic was backed up for miles. Dozens of police cars, fire trucks, and ambulances lined the street, where ornery officers barked at the press to stay on one side of the street. Meanwhile, the activists dangled below the bridge, preventing a coal barge from passing for hours.

The action was part of an ongoing campaign led by Greenpeace and other national and local environmental groups, focused on cleaning up air pollution by replacing both of Chicago’s coal plants with clean energy.

According to Greenpeace, coal fired power plants kill between 13,000 and 34,000 people a year.  That staggering figure includes the 42 Chicagoans who die as a result of pollution from Fisk and Crawford.  And according to a report from the Clean Air Task Force, residents are at risk for heart disease, cancer, and respiratory illness because of pollution from these plants.

“Some may question these aggressive tactics,” said SparkLight Communications President Joseph LaMountain.  “But Greenpeace has carved a unique niche with their ability to draw the spotlight onto issues they care about.  This is critical for the success of any movement and their actions, no matter how outlandish you may find them, have been essential to the environmental community’s success.”

The movement to protest the culture of victim-blaming began in Toronto where the first SlutWalk was organized to protest a police officer’s comment that to avoid being sexually assaulted women should not dress like “sluts.”

These marches have since been organized around the world and one will hit the streets of Hamilton, Ontario in two weeks.  But will the walks achieve their goal, or simply reinforce negative stereotypes?

“The word slut is used to make women feel uncomfortable about how they’re presented to the world and to shame (them), and make them feel they need to police their bodies and police their sexualities in the way they express themselves,” said SlutWalk founder Nikki Wilson, 22, who is from Hamilton.

“We want the word slut to represent a person who is confident in their sexuality, somebody who likes sex and isn’t afraid of talking about that, who isn’t afraid of expressing that.”

According to SlutWalk Hamilton’s Facebook page, more than 800 people are planning on attending the march, which will begin at City Hall at 2 p.m. and then go into Hess Village and end at the Central Police Station.

“These marches have been a great success and they definitely send a message,” said Sparklight President Joseph LaMountain.  “But I question the wisdom of wearing fishnet stockings and other provocative clothing.  While sex generates media coverage and awareness, it could also reinforce some of the negative connotations the group is trying to eliminate.”

SlutWalk organizers could take a lesson from the gay and lesbian community.  They’ve sought to tone down some of the more outrageous behavior in an effort to “normalize” homosexuals in the eyes of the general public.  Over time, this strategy has contributed to increased acceptance of same-sex relationships in American society.

Hutchings was there to explain how he developed a grassroots organization to provide footwear and clean drinking water to people in underdeveloped nations.

Hutchings was a Marine sergeant, earning a Purple Heart for his service in Vietnam. After being wounded and flown to Alaska, he was touched by the simple act of a nurse placing a blanket over him. That was the first “truth” Hutchings said he opened himself up to. He then went on to seminary school and worked on several humanitarian projects.

In 1998, he was in Kenya delivering 30,000 pairs of shoes to orphans and refugees. Later he worked in an African town with a medical center that had no water, yet delivered two infants within 20 minutes of each other. This is when Hutchings put two and two together and came up with the idea to collect and sell old shoes in order to provide water drilling rigs to poor areas in Kenya.

In 2008, Shoeman Water Projects was born. Since then, the organization has collected more than 1.3 million pairs of shoes from donors at schools, churches and businesses.  Hutchings sells the shoes for 35 cents a pound to people who distribute them to be sold by locals.

He uses the money to buy water rigs to drill wells in towns in Africa and Haiti where there is no clean, available water source. The first rig built was at a school in Kenya that had not had water for 10 years due to a broken handle on the only water pump. Shoeman Water Projects also trains local repair staff to maintain the rigs.

According to Hutchings, shoes are almost as important as water because walking on bare feet can cause people to get worms and other parasites that can make them sick. Hutchings showed a slide show of the people he has come to know during his visits to Kenya and other countries. One photo showed a 3-year-old boy holding two jugs as he walked to a dirty watering hole to gather water for his family.

Hutchings’ project has created several sustainable micro-businesses for the local people to sell the shoes at roadside stands and maintain the wells.

The children at the meeting were inspired by Hutchings’ compassion and dedication. “I thought it was cool what he was doing, giving away shoes and fresh water,” said 8-year-old Katherine Johnson, who brought shoes collected at her school, Mount Hope Elementary.

“It was moving that he would do that when obviously most people wouldn’t even think of it,” said Elisabeth Johnson, 11. Johnson and other children at the meeting collected about 1,300 pounds of shoes to donate to the project.

Retired Wahroonga doctor Yvonne McMaster has collected 5800 signatures since launching the campaign in March. She intends to present the petition to Parliament House. Dr McMaster said she had been encouraged by the community response.

“I am now pretty confident we will get at least 10,000 signatures. I have had lots of replies and offers of help,” she said.

As reported in the Advocate in March, Dr McMaster is protesting against “a rationing of services” for the terminally ill after palliative care community funding was cut by $1.2 million by the then Northern Sydney and Central Coast Area Health Service in 2009.