This article will show you how to gather statistics to help you compare recent performance with your performance from previous years in order to better measure your growth.
Support Benchmarks
Broadcast Benchmarks
Advocacy Benchmarks
Total Supporters
How many people support your cause? This is useful to know not only to see how quickly your association's influence is growing but also as a first step in creating other benchmarks.
This benchmark compares the total number of records in your contact list to the same metric at a previous time.
Step 1 - Find Current Total
- Go to Reports > Overview to access the Overview Insights tool.
- View the "Total Contacts" number to the far left.
Step 2 - Find a Previous Month's Total
- On the same page, set the date range to "custom" - specifically ranging from the start of one month to today's date. The example circled in blue below uses 1/1/2023 - 6/6/2023 in order to find the total number of contacts as of December 2022.
- The number of new contacts added during the chosen time period will be shown in the "New Contacts" area circle in green below.
- Simply subtract the number of New Contacts from the number of Total Contacts to find the total number of supporters you had in the month prior to the date you set. In the example shown, I had 4,075 in December of 2022.
Active Advocates
How many of your supporters are actively engaged in helping your advocacy efforts? This is useful to know in order to determine how active your support base is and how well your advocacy efforts are encouraging them to participate.
This benchmark compares the total number of active records in your contact list to the same metric at a previous time.
Step 1 - Find Current Total
- Go to Reports > Overview to access the Overview Insights tool.
- View the "Total Advocates" number to the far left.
Step 2 - Find a Previous Month's Total
- On the same page, set the date range to "custom" - specifically ranging from the start of one month to today's date. The example circled in blue below uses 1/1/2023 - 6/6/2023 in order to find the total number of active members as of December 2022.
- The number of newly engaged supporters during the chosen time period will be shown in the "New Advocates" area circle in green below.
- Simply subtract the number of New Advocates from the number of Total Advocates to find the total number of active advocates you had in the month prior to the date you set. In the example shown, I had 486 in December of 2022.
Open Rate
How many people opened your emails / text messages? This is useful to know because you want to gauge how effective you are at writing attention-grabbing subject lines that do not throw red flags for spam filters.
This benchmark compares the number of emails you send in a broadcast with the number of confirmed opens that broadcast received.
Step 1 - Gather the Metrics
- Go to Reports > Broadcast > View Old Reports
- Set the date range and the type of emails you want to the left, and then click “view report.”
- Click “download csv” to the right to get the data you need.
Step 2 - Calculate Your Rates
- Open that CSV file in a spreadsheet program and add columns for "Open Rate" and maybe "Average Open Rate" if appropriate.
-
For the Open Rate, divide the number of Opens by the number Sent.
=(G2/K2) -
Next, calculate the average and set it to display as a percentage (Format > Number > Percent).
=AVERAGE(O2:O9)
Broadcast Participation Rate
How many broadcast recipients were prompted to take action directly from the broadcast? This is useful to know in order to rate the effectiveness of your communications in prompting immediate action.
This benchmark compares the number of emails we can confirm were opened with the number of advocacy actions prompted by that email.
Step 1 - Gather the Metrics
- Go to Reports > Broadcast > View Old Reports
- Set the date range and choose “advocacy calls to action” to the left; then click “view report.”
- Click “download csv” to the right to get the data you need.
Step 2 - Calculate Your Rates
- Open that CSV file in a spreadsheet program and add columns for "Participation Rate" and maybe "Average Participation Rate" if appropriate.
-
For the Participation Rate, divide the number of Responses by the number of Opens.
=(J2/G2) -
Next, calculate the average and set it to display as a percentage (Format > Number > Percent).
=AVERAGE(O2:O9)
Campaign Participation Rate
How many unique people took action on your advocacy campaigns? This is useful to know in order to evaluate the effectiveness of your advocacy campaigns in prompting action.
This benchmark compares the number of people who took action on a given campaign with the number of people who you told about that advocacy campaign.
This is different from the broadcast participation rate because of two reasons:
- Not everyone who takes action will do so from a broadcast; they might come in natively through your site or even seen a link to the campaign on social media.
- Sending reminder emails vastly increases the campaign participation rate; but the reminder broadcast is separate from the initial broadcast, so their open and action rates don't have anything to do with one another.
Step 1 - Campaign Participants
- Go to Reports > Campaign and click on a campaign.
- The "Total" number circled in red below is the total number of unique individuals who sent messages.
Step 2 - Number of Recipients / Opens
- Scroll down to where you see the call to action broadcast metrics and click on the first call to action broadcast you sent about this campaign. This will bring you to the Broadcast Insights page shown below.
- You may want to compare the number of senders to the total number of valid broadcast recipients you had at the time (circled in red), or you may want to compare it only to the number of people you know opened the email (circled in blue). Talk with your team about which is more appropriate for your case, or use both.
Step 3 - Make your Calculations
- In a spreadsheet, record the number of senders and the total number of recipients / opens you had for the first call to action email broadcast.
-
Divide the number of Senders by the number of Total Contacts / Opens.
=(C2/D2) -
Next, calculate the average and set it to display as a percentage (Format > Number > Percent).
=AVERAGE(E2:E5)
First-Time Advocate Rate
How many first-time advocates participated in your campaign? This is useful to know because you want to assess how effective your advocacy campaigns are in terms of pulling in new advocates as opposed to re-engaging already active supporters.
This benchmark compares the number of people who took action for the first time on a given campaign with the number of people who you told about that advocacy campaign.
Step 1 - Campaign Participants
- Go to Reports > Campaign and click on a campaign.
- The "New Advocates" number circled in red below is the total number of unique individuals who sent messages.
Step 2 - Number of Recipients / Opens
- Scroll down to where you see the call to action broadcast metrics and click on the first call to action broadcast you sent about this campaign. This will bring you to the Broadcast Insights page shown below.
- You may want to compare the number of new advocates to the total number of valid broadcast recipients you had at the time (circled in red), or you may want to compare it only to the number of people you know opened the email (circled in blue). Talk with your team about which is more appropriate for your case, or use both.
Step 3 - Make your Calculations
- In a spreadsheet, record the number of senders and the total number of recipients / opens you had for the first call to action email broadcast.
-
Divide the number of New Senders by the number of Total Contacts / Opens.
=(C2/D2) -
Next, calculate the average and set it to display as a percentage (Format > Number > Percent).
=AVERAGE(E2:E5)
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