Hospice Lottery Partnership
Profiling helps Hospice Lottery Partnership target membership drive
Situation
As the new Chief Executive of the Hospice Lottery Partnership, Helen Elliott had plenty of ideas as to how to increase membership. However, she found herself repeating the same questions:
“What is our actual penetration? How much growth potential is there? What do our members actually look like? Will growth come from our current supporters or from a new profile of member? And, where do they live?”
Challenges
The lottery member records could not easily be cross-referenced with the donor records of the hospices being supported. Something dispassionate and objective was required to get a true picture of performance to date against which the impact of future actions could be measured.
With finite resources, what was the appropriate balance between investing in improved member retention and new donor acquisition – and where were the ‘quick wins’?
Solution
“Get thee to Wallingford!” was the first message.
Penetration by socio-demographic group by area was measured and compared to the Electoral Roll. This immediately showed Post Codes where regional recruitment and telephone canvassing had the best chance of success – and it was not just in Wallingford!
“In a matter of a few days, David was able to run a profile on our active membership that showed who our members were and where they lived. The real value came when this data was mapped by Post Code area so that for the first time we could see where exactly the areas of potential that we had missed.”
Profiling work also identified that there were two types of member – the traditional hospice supporter and the local lottery player. The work is acting as a guide to different recruitment and retention strategies that are required to properly engage each group.
Benefits
A clear membership target has been set with this split between retention and recruitment.
The impact of new retention measures can be clearly tracked against targets. Meantime, the recruitment investment has been targeted to areas of greatest potential and showed benefits within days of being put in place.
As Helen said “The whole activity has been illuminating. For the first time, we know what is a practical target for our membership. We also now know exactly where we can make most impact, most quickly. As we introduce new products and recruitment techniques, again we now appreciate exactly who these will be appropriate for. And finally, the whole experience has been great fun!
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