November 4, 2009 — A new survey of 38 top nonprofits by Care2 reveals that many of these well known organizations are essentially flunking “Email Marketing 101.” Perhaps the most damning statistic is that, on average, nonprofits are taking eight whole days to email a response to someone who signs up for their email list. The survey also showed that nonprofits are employing a wide variety of approaches – all over the map, really -- to welcome and cultivate new email subscribers, thereby indicating that there still is no widely adopted “best practice” for this situation. Yet another key finding was that most nonprofits don’t display email signup and registration opportunities prominently or particularly effectively on their sites. And the actual copy on the sign-up forms was pretty mediocre, too.
November 4, 2009 — Newspapers may be reporting on the demise of e-mail, and some research indicates that young people are turning more toward social networking than more traditional online communication, but college students still see e-mail as a critical medium for messages.
In its whitepaper "How Do You Measure Up?," Convio shares four online trends every fundraiser should know to make the most of his or her organization's online presence and to stay engaged and foster relationships with constituents.
BOSTON, October 27, 2009 — E-mail is the preferred channel of communication for US consumers, followed by direct mail, social media and finally telemarketing. These are the findings of a new survey conducted by smartFOCUS, a leading international provider of multi-channel marketing software and services.
October 20, 2009, DM News — Though three-quarters of nonprofits gather consumers' names and locations when they sign up for e-mail communications, that's often where consumer data collection ends for those groups, according to a Return Path study, released October 20.
October 12, 2009, The Wall Street Journal — Email has had a good run as king of communications. But its reign is over.
September 29, 2009, MediaPost — If social networks are truly transforming how consumers communicate, shouldn't they be affecting the Web's original killer app: email? Not at all, according to preliminary data from Nielsen. To the contrary: "It actually appears that social media use makes people consume email more, not less, as we had originally assumed -- particularly for the highest social media users," says Jon Gibs, VP of media analytics at Nielsen.
E-mail is a great option for fundraising communications because it's inexpensive and provides virtually instant access to friends and supporters. What's more, it's measurable.
In the session "The Right Message: Making the Most of E-mail Marketing in a Down Economy" at the DMA Nonprofit Federation's 2009 New York Nonprofit Conference, Allison Van Diest, senior product marketing manager for Blackbaud, shared best practices for creating strong positioning and message architecture.
Melville, NY, August 21, 2009 — The EGC Group (www.egcgroup.com) a leading marketing and advertising agency has announced a strategic partnership with VerticalResponse, Inc. (www.verticalresponse.com), a leading provider of on-demand email marketing, online survey and direct mail solutions.
August 4, 2009, DMNews — E-mail marketing spending will continue to expand at double-digit rates – 18.5% per year – for the next five years, according to Veronis Suhler Stevenson (VSS), a private equity firm, in its annual Communications Industry Forecast published on August 3. VSS specializes in the information and media industries. A link to a PDF of the company's findings is found at the top of this article.
