Responding During Crisis – The Fellowship

By Katharine Kraft
December 1, 2006

The Situation

War brings tremendous pain and tragedy upon the people and the lands where it is fought. It results in immediate needs for aid during the war and ongoing support for rebuilding after hostilities end. When the unexpected outbreak of war created urgent needs in Israel in July 2006, The International Fellowship of Christians and Jews (also known as “The Fellowship”) creatively used the Internet to respond and mobilize its donor database to provide immediate aid and support to suffering Israelis.

Founded by Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein in 1983, The Fellowship’s two-fold mission is to promote understanding and cooperation between Christians and Jews and to build broad support for Israel and Jewish people around the world. It has a well established presence in Israel, and annually provides millions of dollars in aid to needy Israelis. Thus, when war broke out, The Fellowship was perfectly positioned to leverage existing infrastructure as one of the first organizations to deliver aid and support to those affected by the fighting. The challenge was how to appropriately deliver this perspective and mobilize constituents in the United States to support the relief efforts.

The Fellowship enlisted Silas Partners’ expertise several months before the war began to help them with the development of a long-term web strategy, website redesign, database building and content management. Even though major projects had just been initiated, Silas Partners was able to spring into action and work with The Fellowship to quickly organize and execute a communication plan that would seize the opportunity to strengthen relationships with existing supporters and capture the attention and trust of new supporters.

The Solution

In a post-Katrina world, people have become accustomed to receiving fast-breaking news via the Internet. Thus, the Internet was the logical and cost-effective starting point for The Fellowship to quickly communicate the needs in Israel and mobilize constituents to provide desperately needed support.

Silas Partners helped The Fellowship develop and implement multiple strategies to convey the breadth and timeliness of the work being carried out in Israel. First, a war blog was created to share first-hand accounts from staff in Israel. The blog was regularly updated, sometimes even several times a day, with reports of the aid being delivered, personal reflections from Israelis coping with the war, and travelogues of visits through war-torn areas. These personal reflections kept visitors returning to the site and developed a bond between constituents in the United States with the work in Israel.

To further strengthen the bond, Silas Partners helped The Fellowship develop a letter that constituents could sign online to show their support for the people of Israel and Fellowship staff working in Israel. In an overwhelming response, 12,500 signatures of encouragement were collected, yielding over 3,000 new members to The Fellowship from this initiative alone.

During the war months, The Fellowship tripled the amount of email sent to its supporters. The email file responded well, and The Fellowship was established as a trusted news source about the war with these individuals. Harnessing the power of the Internet’s quick-response capability, the organization was able to use an online poll to determine that individuals were satisfied with the level of communication they were receiving. This satisfaction with The Fellowship was reflected in the response to the emails that were sent. During the first month of the war, when quick response is critical, over 28% of online donations came from response to emails sent to constituents.

The best relationships are two-way. When Israeli mayors wrote thank-you letters to The Fellowship for its timely and generous support, the organization harnessed the power of a two-way relationship by sharing those letters with its constituents. Interestingly, people responded to the mayors’ thank-you letters by donating even more! In fact, the money raised from the emails highlighting these thank-you letters represented 13.5% of all funds collected through special war-time emails in July and August 2006.

The most unique news that The Fellowship could provide to its supporters came directly from Rabbi Yechiel Eckstein. As an orthodox rabbi traveling throughout northern Israel to participate in relief efforts, he offered a distinct vantage point on the situation. The Fellowship recorded a conference call of Rabbi Eckstein giving his assessment of the situation in Israel. Silas Partners made the recording available on the web for thousands of listeners. This popular resource added yet another dimension to the many resources The Fellowship provided during the crisis.

Finally, The Fellowship integrated its web efforts with other communication channels such as television to provide a consistent message to the new audience they acquired during the war. While running television advertisements on Fox News Channel, a similar video clip was posted on the website with additional information and ways to take action (e.g. donate, sign a letter of support, or tell friends). This effectively allowed The Fellowship to capture information from new visitors and convert them into members. The Fellowship then had permission to cultivate a deeper relationship with the individual through both electronic and print mail.

The Results

All of these activities produced dramatic results for The Fellowship. Relationships deepened with existing supporters as their confidence in The Fellowship’s work grew.

By converting visitors to donors, online revenue increased by 109% during the months of the war. Once donors heard about the difference their donations and actions were making, their trust in the organization increased. This trust led to further action, resulting in over 5,000 people telling their friends and family about The Fellowship. A large number of these people became donors. In fact during the war months, there was a 260% growth in first-time online donors.

The Fellowship not only deepened ties with existing supporters, but its reach expanded to capture new supporters as well. During July and August, over 13,500 people registered online. This represents a 253% increase of registrations from other, non-war months. Thus, The Fellowship could not only inform these supporters about its war efforts, but it could continue after the war to develop a relationship with these individuals.

Perhaps the most significant result from The Fellowship’s wartime efforts has been the increased activity from their supporters during the post-war period. With its support-base re-energized, the amount of online donations generated after the war has increased 95% compared to the same time last year. Supporters continue to respond strongly to emails. Click-through rates are up 42% from pre-war levels, demonstrating that constituents are far more engaged and active with The Fellowship.

The wealth of new supporters in the database has also given The Fellowship opportunities to deepen those relationships. For instance, many of the new constituents added to the database during the war only provided name and email address. Silas Partners helped The Fellowship develop and implement a campaign to acquire mailing addresses, enabling communication through both online and offline channels. Thus far, these address acquisition campaigns have proven to be successful, capturing addresses for 9% of all people without a mailing address.

The bottom line is that during this time of crisis, The Fellowship was able to provide help, hope and encouragement to Israelis while expanding, building and strengthening its relationships with its donor constituents. And the work goes on today, as The Fellowship continues to bring Christians and Jews together to help support Israel and needy Jewish people around the world.

If you would like to find out more about how to implement these strategies and ideas in your organization, please take a moment to let us know a little about your needs.