Data and campaigning
Glyn Thomas
Email: glyn@glyn-thomas.co.uk
Twitter: @glynmthomas
Website: www.glynthomas.com
Data and campaigning
- Key things organisations measure during campaigns
- Key things organisations should be measuring
- Brief introduction to Google Analytics
- Brief introduction to testing
- Statistical significance
- Ethical questions around collecting data
What would you want
to know?
How many people visited the petition webpage
How many people signed the petition
How many people said they would like to be
contacted by email in future
How many people clicked Share on Facebook
How many people clicked Share on Twitter
How many donations
How many regular donations / How many one-off donations
Average donation amount
How many people received the email
How many people opened the email
How many people clicked the button in the email
How many people emailed their MP from the email
How many people unsubscribed
Vanity metrics
Vanity metrics
Numbers that on their own are meaningless or don't tell the full picture
eg. you could have 10,000 people on your email list, or following you on Facebook, but are any of them opening your emails? Are any of them sharing your content?
Number of subscribers
Website
Pageviews
Social media
Followers
Good metrics are...
comparative
a ratio or a rate
40% of people who sign the petition opt in to receiving emails
10% of people who received the email signed the petition
affect what you do
learn from them - what has worked well and what hasn't worked so well
How is this data recorded and analysed?
Google Analytics
Matomo
Plausible
In software
Mailchimp
Engaging Networks
Impact Stack
Testing
Things to test
- Email subject lines
- Email content
- Page headline
- Page image
Testing procedure
- Subject line A
- Subject line B
- 10% get version A
- 10% get version B
- Remaining 80% get the winner
Could test journey
And where in journey you place the call to action
Statistical significance
95% certain that it's not random or chance
Ethical questions about data collection
Why is this relevant?
As campaigners and activists do we want to support companies and businesses that don't share our values?
Or do we have to pragmatic? Tools provided by these companies are user friendly / cheap / in widespread use
Safety and security of campaigners and activists - who is tracking them and what danger could we be putting them in?
Adaption to data-driven practices in civil society organizations: A case study of Amnesty International
(2020), Journal of Information Technology & Politics, DOI: 10.1080/19331681.2019.1710645
Digital membership organizations assert that their innovative use of data-driven practices is at the heart of their people-powered decision-making models. These data-driven practices, and associated values, have become aspirational to other organizations. However, there are growing concerns that data practices reinforce the decision-making power of the data collector at the expense of the rights of the data subject. [...]
The results show how the use of data to be people-powered is a powerful discourse, but ultimately new data practices are only used to centralize power, as is purported by critical literature.
GDPR
Data protection / privacy
Where is data stored?
Collecting more data than need to?
Consent?
Give supporters chance to opt out
Data and Campaigning 2022
By Glyn Thomas
Data and Campaigning 2022
Lecture for the University of Westminster on data, testing and analytics.
