Increased Email and Text Blast Cadence 

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January 2023 Memo to Volunteers

You may have noticed a recent increase in the frequency of fundraising email blasts and text messages from Sister District. We understand that receiving more fundraising messages can be overwhelming at first, so we’d like to take a moment to explain the reasoning behind this increase and provide some context on its impact.

This increase in frequency is in line with industry best practices for political organizations. As an active member of the progressive activism ecosystem, chances are your email list has probably made its way onto a number of other candidate and advocacy organization’s email lists. You’ve no doubt noticed that other organizations employ a similar level of frequency! 

Data-driven decisions

We track our email and text engagement data closely, and it clearly shows that this approach has not resulted in a substantive increase in unsubscribes or spam complaints from users. 

In fact, 2022 was our second-largest digital fundraising year since Sister District was founded, and more than double the next-highest fundraising year. This increase in fundraising applies both to endorsed candidates and to HQ fundraising efforts to fund our operations. Put another way: with the exception of 2020, we raised the most in 2022 on digital for candidates, HQ, and State Bridges organizations than in any other year. 

Fundraising efforts by our teams were no different. As you can see on your Team Fundraising Dashboard, Sister District teams raised more in 2022 for candidates and State Bridges than in any other year aside from 2020 (a historic presidential year!). Candidate fundraising from volunteer teams was more than 37% higher than the next-highest year, and 26% higher for Bridges recipients. Rest assured: the expanded digital program from HQ is only helping team fundraising.

In July 2022, we began this ambitious expansion of our digital fundraising program. Below is an illustration of the impact that investment has had on our digital fundraising success:

Simply put: these tactics work!

Recommendations for team fundraising

In a world where every organization is constantly competing for audiences’ time and attention, short, targeted, single-ask messages are the best way to reach people. Readers have limited time, so the easier and faster a message is to read, the easier it is to engage. 

We encourage you to adopt a similar approach when communicating with your teams. Shorter, more frequent messages, which have only one clear ask (i.e. RSVP for an event or donate to a specific candidate) will result in higher engagement and more dollars in the door.

You can work with an organizing department staffer to plan out your email cadence and sequences for newsletters and event/project-specific communications.

Team fundraising blitzes 

If your team is planning a concentrated fundraising project, you can request that HQ pause email and text blasts for your team for a period of time. Please make this request in the #volunteer-leaders channel in Slack, tagging your Organizing Manager or @comms. Don’t forget to include:

  • Your team name
  • Exact dates for the pause
  • Whether we should pause email, text, or both

As always, thank you so much for your continued dedication and attention to Sister District and our mission. After a banner year in 2022, we are as enthusiastic as ever for our work in 2023 and beyond. 

P.S. If you or anyone on your team wants to receive a lower cadence of emails from Sister District, they can always follow this link to be tagged for a lighter cadence.

Next Memo: How Email Editors Can Promote Phonebank Programs