NTEN Webinar Roundup: Stepping Up Your E-mail Marketing, Part 3

If you're looking for call-to-action ideas, Fignar shared the following 10 things organizations can ask online supporters to do:

1. Sign a petition. This can work whether you do advocacy work or not. She said Bideawee built a viral acquisition campaign around its animal bill of rights and the simple question of whether recipients believed in its mission
2. Send someone else an e-mail
3. Go to an event in real life
4. Buy something to support the cause
5. Give money
6. Refer a friend
7. Send an e-card to a staff member or child
8. Watch a video, listen to an interview, read something (online or off) to learn more about the issue. "At the end of the video, drive them somewhere to learn more about content in video," Fignar suggested.
9. Write a story or otherwise contribute relevant content
10. Call someone on the phone to express an opinion

She concluded the webinar with the following bullet points of advice:

• Communicate and develop community online.
• Give every e-mail a primary goal. Fignar said newsletters must have a ranking and prioritization of stories.
• Always be able to answer the donor question, "What can you do with my gift that you couldn't do without it?"
• Remember that e-mail is about the reader. Reading online is harder. Include bullets and text links, and be sure the images you use are relevant and linked.
• It's about the psychology, not the technology. Fignar advised thinking about your readers first; using engaging subject lines that tell recipients what they're opening; creating clear goals and calls to action; pointing the reader to the next action you want her to take using graphics, bullets and text links; sealing the deal with the landing page; and taking advantage of recipients' undivided attention on the thank-you page and in the thank-you e-mail.