When M+R began working with The Wilderness Society in 2004, the organization wanted to expand its email list and raise substantially more money online, all without compromising the effectiveness of its existing online advocacy efforts.  M+R helped build a sustainable online program using rigorous analysis to improve performance and retention of donors, subscribers and activists. 

Key components of the program included:

• A series of online recruitment campaigns that combined paid advertising with cross-promotion, earned media and online outreach;
• An online fundraising program that integrated closely with marketing campaigns, urgent advocacy issues, and direct mail fundraising;
• Development of an award-winning monthly e-newsletter, WildAlert News;
• Ongoing reporting and evaluation combined with a quarterly planning process; and
• Comprehensive testing and analysis, including list segmentation to improve the performance of messaging and fundraising campaigns.

Since the implementation of M+R’s plan, TWS as been able to:

• Grow its list at a rate of 400% to more than 280,000 subscribers;
• Reduce ‘list churn’ among its less active members while continuing intensive messaging to its most active subscribers;
• Dramatically increase the response rate to advocacy alerts; and
• Quadruple its annual online revenue!