The Best Performing Election Emails in 2019

While we can breathe a sigh of relief it won’t be in May, a General Election is fast approaching.

In 2019 I was Head of Mobilisation for the Labour Party, overseeing how we got members and supporters to take action, whether it was donating money or volunteering. Our team of ten sent emails, texts, whatsapps, held mass video calls and collaborated with our on the ground organisers to build the power to win.  Recently Politico and Times Radio asked me to speak about when I was Head of Mobilisation for The Labour Party, which got me thinking.

The result of that election was gutwrenching. But while I will always be saddened by the loss, I am proud of the tens of thousands across the country who came together to campaign. I am proud of the record-breaking amount of small donations from ordinary people too.

As the party moved away from big donors, the people across the UK who chipped in a little became incredibly important. The increase in membership from 200,000 to 552,000 meant in 2018 Labour raised £10 million more than the super-rich Tories.

Relying on the hard earned cash of a people powered movement allows organisations to represent ordinary people, not be beholden to vested interests. So when in the 2019 election we were able to raise £5.1 million, with the average donation just £20, I was thrilled.

Of course time has moved on. But while some indicators show a decrease in the reach of our emails, its demise is greatly over exaggerated. Alongside SMS and social media, it’s still a powerful tool for campaigners. Biden is raising tens of millions a month to beat Donald Trump, and small donations matter even more here in the UK where we have strict rules on donations, away from powerful PACs.

So what can charities and non-profits learn from the best performing emails from the last election?

Here are 3 emails that performed well in the 2019 General Election

“They’re outbidding us”

“We've just seen a massive increase in Tory spending online…”

We updated supporters to let them know that the Conservative Party had been throwing loads of money at online advertising. We explained that we wanted to pay for our own online adverts but we didn’t have the big donors of the Tory Party, so we’d need ordinary people to step up.

When the Tories’ ad spending was covered in the news we knew this was something that we should tell our members. It created a clear and compelling reason to chip in to our campaign fund. Asking supporters to pay for something specific can be really effective - whether it’s a billboard, a new staff member, or a new community centre.

Lesson: Use urgency and be specific about where your money will go

“Last night you shocked me…”

“…As soon as Parliament voted to hold the election, supporters like you dashed to kickstart our campaign, with over £190k raised just last night!”

Now this one sent Twitter into meltdown. As well as going viral, it also raised a lot of money! Email “flights” are often the best way to raise money and this was part of emails sent quickly after each other in the space of 24 hours.

We asked supporters to donate an amount and then kept them updated on the progress they were making as a community. It felt like we were doing something amazing together, and hopefully it felt fun at the same time.

Lesson: Respond quickly to current events like announcements, news stories, TV appearances. Use a clear target and timeframe to encourage donations.

“Hope”

“India, I'll be honest with you, and it will probably come as no surprise. I don't like sending emails asking people for money...”

The last email sent to supporters during the General Election had to be special. That’s why we tested a longer form message from the leader in his personal style, speaking clearly and emotionally to his movement. Conventional wisdom would say to put the buttons asking for money higher up in the email but when it came to that special day, results showed the longer version performed better.

While I’m guilty of using email cliches, I have a real bug bear for when organisations over-egg their emails to the point they feel inauthentic, patronising or even scary. In this case breaking best practice brought in money, but sometimes even if an email does bring in more money it could be damaging in the long-term. For example, if you keep telling people it’s their “|ast chance” to help, at what point do they stop believing in what you say?

Lesson: While we should mostly follow lessons learnt from years of A/B email testing, our relationship to supporters is important and we should never become inauthentic.

What next for political emails?

Well, if you’re on a political party’s email list, expect to get a lot of emails over the next few months and even more when the regulated election period begins. Meanwhile, in the states, they’ll be sending even more as Biden takes on Trump. We know that US charities send 61 emails to subscribers each year to UK charities’ 27.

And for you…

While most of you reading won’t be working on political parties campaigns, there’s lessons that can be utitilised across the campaigning and non-profit space. Urgency. Specificity. Authenticity. Sending emails in “flights”!

Oh and if you don’t want to end up in the news always get two people to check each email line by line, on different devices and check the scheduled time too….