The foundation recently began to post educational videos on YouTube, "as we know that is where potential donors are visiting," he says. It then integrated this with a local Starbucks project to offer a campaign called "'Lupus, Learning and Lattes,' something that even people without lupus can understand," Estrin explains. The program offers support and education that allows for both social and supportive components.
Last year the foundation updated its main Web site with information and the branding strategy of: 1) There is more to lupus than you know, and 2) someone you know has lupus. According to Estrin, "Those two messages restated against the backdrop of our e-communications makes the ask logical." The foundation then sent a new e-mail campaign with the message, "We can see that you have enjoyed and (from the back-end dashboard) that you are reading our e-mails. Would you be: 1) Willing to upgrade your membership; 2) attend our gala; or 3) donate to our Mother’s Day, Passover or Annual Campaign?" This new campaign, sent to members who had not yet donated, was met with increased clickthroughs, hitting between 16.3 percent and 20.7 percent.
Estrin says he encouraged the foundation to add an electronic component to its campaigns because "donors and potential donors are merely a click away from any number of links to our main site, event landing pages and the like. They can learn more about lupus based on what they feel is compelling for them." By integrating links to search pages and information about every form of lupus, he says it "do[es] not discount interest in donations to a specific area of service provision."
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