Trail Blazer, Non-Profit and Political Talk!

As wiki tells me 'The holiday commemorates the Mexican army's unlikely defeat of French forces at the Battle of Puebla on May 5, 1862, under the leadership of Mexican General Ignacio Zaragoza Seguin.'

Here we celebrate some early victories and tomorrow Mark Panger's Birthday.  We have to congratulate Cynthia Lee-Sheng and Clyde Holloway for their recent wins.  Cynthia even defeated a sitting state senator (and a past client, perhaps they should have renewed their license with us) to win outright in the primary.  And Clyde Holloway’s challenger in the runoff dropped out (I’m sure it is because they found out Clyde had Trail Blazer on his side) a week after the primary.

And I almost forgot on Friday some or all of us might be out of the office for a viewing of the new Star Trek movie official meeting of the Trail Blazer team.

TTFN

Brian Hanf

We are beginning the process of upgrading our customer databases to the new multiple addresses per person capability.  This will also allow us to release the enhanced householding feature and query save feature.

What does this mean to you?

Sometime between now and May 15, we expect to complete the upgrade to your database.  You do not need to do anything to facilitate this.

IMPORTANT - for use to ensure data integrity while your database is in use, we will rename the old address fields to prevent access.  If you are in the database when this occurs, you will receive an error when attempting to open a search panel.  You should exit Trail Blazer.  Depending on the size of your database, the upgrade may require a few minutes up to couple of hours to complete.

After your database has been upgraded, your Trail Blazer look will change in a few ways.  This article details some of those changes:  http://www.trailblz.com/kb/?action=view&kb=91&cat=10.

This article provides information regarding address management:  http://www.trailblz.com/kb/?action=view&kb=94&cat=1

Thanks,

Trail Blazer Campaign Services, Inc

Check out the Trail Blazer Page on Facebook!!!

We need people to sign up as fans, so hop to it!

or paste www.facebook.com/pages/Trail-Blazer-Software/64872951180

Time keeps on flying by for us here at Trail Blazer.  We try to update this blog on a regular basis but that is not happening as often as we like.  It's because of the bears; ok that is just an excuse.  But the reason is - we are busy working overtime for you.  Building some new tools and making some current tools more powerful and easier to use.

I will give you a preview of one item getting a makeover, Search.

We are Building some cool new designs for the search panels, to add functions to your searches.  BTW where you enter search criteria, with a name like Name, Address, Profile, or Contribution, is what we call a search panel.

Changed the positioning and layout (hope you like it) so some buttons are getting moved around, so you might get a little vertigo at first.  We didn't do it to make you dizzy.

What am I talking about?  Some thing like the button I hope you click very often - the [Search] button.  The [Search] button is now on the left instead of the right.  We did this because many of our clients are getting bigger screens and the button was very far away from the search panels and we were adding more buttons so those clients with smaller screens were getting the button cut off the screen.  Presto Change-o and both problems solved with one move of the button.

Current View:

Notice the red circles, [Search] is on the left most position of the new view:

In addition we added a few icons to the search panels and moved some icons and functions to what is called a tool strip.  By default you see the icon for [Include] it looks like two extension cords getting plugged together (more about [Include] later) and the icon for [more tools].  The [more tools] icon kind of looks like the play symbol on your VCR (CD, DVD, DVR, TIVO, etc).

More Tools Button:

We will have a bunch of stuff (emails, blog entries, KB updates) coming out with additional details on everything that is in the [more tools] area.  Just to get you stated though.  We moved the panel level [And/Or] button from the right hand side to the [more tools] area, the [not] check box is button in the [move tools] area also.  See image below.

Above image shows the expanded view, when you click the [more tools].

The red circles from left to right:

1. [Include] button, new to most panels - was on Contribution as a check box.

2. [Reset] button, moved from the bottom left.

3. [Not] button was a check box on the middle left side.

4. [And] and [Or] buttons, were on the middle right hand side.

One of the coolest items that we added was a tool to show the active panels, it is not in the pictures I am providing because it was in early production as I began writing this.  When you click this new functions button all the panels get hidden except for the ones that have search stuff filled out.  So if you can not figure out why a search is not working you can limit the view to what you have and use that to double check your work.  So, once limited you can use that new [Include] (told you I would talk more about it) tool to turn off panels to see how that might affect your search results. It is pretty neat!!

I think that might be enough of a preview for one day.

Oh ok you got me to talk a little more.  The coolest stuff coming out very soon is: Dashboard, Address Normalization, Tasks (expansion of reminders), and View Specific Online Help.

Dashboard: add a note to your screen, keep a voter list in view, open RSS feeds, and more.

Address Normalization:  Instead of just home, mailing, work - you now will have ability to add multiple homes, works, assign them as mailing address and much more.

Task/Reminder:  Some people are using log notes and reminders now, we are enhancing that system to a 'heads up' style display so you can see your reminder items at all times.

View Specific Online Help:  Or as we call it V-SOP, yeah we don't really call it that, it's just the blue help button.  So if you have ever looked at a Trail Blazer screen and said what does this do, or what do I do with this - (Me neither, but some people do) we added a little [help] button.  It looks like a question mark in a blue circle that you can click and a help screen just for what you are looking at will appear (subject to us having built the help web page).

Ok with that said I will get back to actually making the changes, write to you later!!!

This past year Trail Blazer has joined several professional organizations including: Minnesota Council of Nonprofits (mncn.org), Midwest Political Science Association - MPSA (mpsanet.org), and American Association of Political Consultants and Public Affairs Professionals - AAPC (theaapc.org).  The AAPC sent me a certificate of membership, I like certificates.

We just got back from the Trail Blazer annual Holiday party.  (Is an annual party if we only have one every other year?)  We went to the local bowling ally and bowled, ate pizza, and had root beer.  Jim, who has his own ball, bowled 144, 171, and 138.  Pat a 75, 118, and 163.  Mark was 114, 147 and 105.  I bowled a 139, 131 and 154.

So that was fun, we got to get out of the office and talk about stuff that we don’t normally talk about, like politics and cool new technology. J

OK now I need a nap.

We are now past Halloween (and campaign season) so the holiday fundraising has begun.  So I have compiled 9 Tips for success for those needing to raise money via email.

1. What name appears in your “from” box?
   Be sure your organization name is in the “from” box.  Lots of people might not know that Jane Whosit is the Director/Manager of your organization.

2. Your subject line needs to grab them.
   Let the reader see what you are going to tell them in the email, Newsletter Fall 2008, doesn’t make me want to open the email.  Be aware that your subject line does NOT look the same in all email packages (Outlook, AOL, Eudora).  This tool,  http://www.emaillabs.com/tools/from_subject_line_tool_popup.html,  this site is down now can be handy in showing you how the from and subject line will appear in these packages.  this tool helps with subject line creation http://www.localnews.biz/subjectLine/ValidateSubjectLine.asp
    
3. See the big picture!  Does your message look like something out of a magazine?  Lots of graphic images.  Cut ‘em out!  Well at least cut the amount and size down.  Half or more of your subscribers probably block images.  Break it down so only have a few and they are not critical to the message.  Make sure the important information is in text form so it shows up regardless of the images.  If you have some HTML ability use the “alt” tags in the HTML code to describe what is in the picture, often this will display if the image does not. 
   
   
4. Just the Basics, No web Programmers allowed
   Remove CSS (Style Sheets) because Outlook 2007 will not display an email properly that utilizes CSS.  For those with some technical skills anything that is not “plain” html should be removed, that means no style sheets or scripts.  The images you do have should be references (web links) and not imbedded.  No attachments.

5. Include the essentials:
   1. Organization name prominently displayed
   2. Address and contact info: Telephone, email and web contact page link
   3. Email address used to send the message should be displayed in the email
   4. Does the unsubscribe link work (and directions prominently displayed)

Note you should also have an EMAIL/SPAM policy on your web site, and the email should have a link to this policy.

5. Optional: Keep a copy of the email on your web site. Link to this from within the email.  This is beneficial for people who read your emails in TEXT only format.  You’re on-line email version can have as much graphics and special programming (like CSS) as you would like.

6. Proof, test, proof, test, proof …
   As the king of bad spelling and grammar I know how critical this is.  Nothing makes you look like a second rate organization (or a spammer) like spelling or coding mistakes.   Often this is in the body or the links you want your readers to use.  Always, I mean never, let an email go out that you have not sent to 2-3 people with various email providers (AOL, Yahoo, Gmail etc.) as a test.  You want to see from as many views as possible how the message looks.  And have those friends who test read the email look for spelling, grammar, and general look and feel.  Find a friend that gets only text versions so you have that view as well.

7. Consider your target and action time needed to boost results. 
   Make sure that readers who you are asking to volunteer tomorrow live in the area in need of volunteers. On the other hand if the request is far enough in the future, so they could make travel plans, don’t exclude people.  If you’re holding a $1000 dinner, a 20 year old college student who donated $10 when they were 18 might not be the best person to send an invite to, but the 55 year old doctor who donated $500 each of the last 10 years might be.

8. Contact newcomers with enthusiasm. 
   An immediate welcome email should be sent.  Follow-up phone calls are great for thanking them, and asking why they signed up – if resources allow of course – to establish a bond.  In any case let them know what to expect from your organization, in terms of email, other contacts and activism.  Always let them know what is your organization is missing. Keep that list on your web site as well.  Our client, Kairos Dance, has a great example of a wish list (what’s missing), http://www.kairosdance.org/pages/kairos-wish-list-donate.

9. Handle Spam Complaints NOW! 
   As more email is sent, from your organization or others, the subscribers just feel overwhelmed and you can expect complaints to go up.  Having a simple unsubscribe process is not enough; there are people who will complain via your ISP or other methods.  When you get feedback of an unsubscribe, act on it right away.

You can attempt to minimize increases in unsubscribe requests by planning your frequency, and sticking to the plan.  Resist the temptation or orders from those higher on the pay scale to send more often.

A resource, which is worth checking out, is http://www.emailexperience.org/ for more tips.  They are a group of email marketers.

These 9 items, in my opinion, have the ability to be implemented without a major investment in time or labor.  Keep notes during the holidays and your organization will have lots of feed back on what worked and did not work.  Keep those notes close so you can make improvements when the smoke clears in the New Year.

While the historical statistic is that 90% of incumbents win elections.   Trail Blazer clients continued to do better than that statistic again this year. 

Out of our clients that were candidates challenging an incumbent, we have a 2008 win percent of 16%.  It should be noted that over 20% of our challengers were 3^rd party candidates while none of them won several did very well – more on that later.  Our incumbents won 100% of their races.  In open seats we had a win percent of 42%.  We had one client drop out very early in the 2008 election cycle - they dropped out in December 2007.

We had victories in Pennsylvania, Missouri, Colorado, California, Louisiana and our home state of Minnesota.

We want to congratulate all of our clients on hard fought campaigns.

Our political clients are city council and state house level clients.  Most are small grassroots efforts with volunteers and not a paid staff.   

We are a nonpartisan firm and look forward to continuing to work with candidates from all parties.  I stated before that over 20% of our clients that challenged incumbents were running under a 3^rd party ballot line.  Most note worthy of those this past year was former senator Dean Barkley.  The Barkley for Senate campaign started in the polls at around 4-6% or they were not included in the poll at all.  In the end he received over 15% of the vote total for that U S Senate race.