2012 TSDigs Metrics Learning Report

2012 TechSoup Digital Storytelling

ChallengeMetrics + Learning

Intro

The third annual TechSoup Digital Storytelling Challenge took place in February 2012, and involved:

• 3 video production webinars, led by Lights. Camera. Help.• 1 Nonprofits Live Interactive Online Show• 3 live Tweet Chats• Special/dedicated digital storytelling page• 4 Main Judges Award categories• 9 Honorable Mentions• 2 Community voted “Audience Choice” photo and video awards

Overall, this year’s event had a huge increase not only in the number of entries, but also to traffic to the TSDigs page, global participation, and community engagement. Here are some of the results:

Entries

There were 261 submissions for the Digital Storytelling Challenge. Of those, 206 were videos and 55 were photo entries. 59 came from organizations/individuals registered with TechSoup.

For comparison, that is over double of the submissions from the 2011 Challenge (+151%), and almost double (+46%) the amount of participation of TechSoup members.

Webinars

Although Webinar participation was strong, it was one part of the Challenge which we saw decline. There were a total of 911 participants across the three webinars and one Nonprofits Live events. In 2011, there were 1,263 participants for two webinars.

Of the webinar participants, 31 submitted entries and 61 made donation requests. This is an increase from last year, where only 16 received donations.

Storytelling Main Page

This year, we purchased “TSDigs.org” and redirected to the main storytelling page on TechSoup, replacing tiny.cc/tsdigs. Besides being easier to remember, we believe this helped in sharing. The page was viewed 10,482 times during the month of the campaign, up from 2,763 for the campaign last year.

Summary

Overall, 388 registered organizations and 458 registered individuals were involved in the 2012 Digital Storytelling Challenge, either by attending a webinar, entering a digital story, voting in the community Audience Choice Award or receiving a donation after visiting a digital storytelling page or resource.

Although the number of registered organizations decreased from 519* in 2011, the number of first time registrations, first time ordering, and number of donation requests increased.

Donation requests of featured products also doubled, from 21 to 47.*The number of registered orgs participating in 2011, was also calculated differently and should not necessarily be compared “apples to apples” to this year’s TSDigs Challenge.

Snapshot2011 2012 Difference Change

Submissions 104 261 157 151%YouTube 80 206 126 158%

Flickr 24 55 31 129%Votes 1,216 5,314 4,098 337%

Webinar/NPLive Attendees 1,263 911 -352 -28%

Countries 8 24 16 200%Page Views 2,763 10,482 7,719 279%

Products from sponsors used to make story (Of 261 Entries, 227

answered)154 59%

Adobe 60 39%Flip 47 31%

Flickr 32 21%

TechSoup Members & DonationsTSDIGS OVERALL 2011 2012 Difference %Change

1st Time Registration (Organizations) 5 18 13 260%

1st Time Registration (Individuals) n/a 47 n/a n/a

1st Time Ordering Orgs 14 15 1 7%

Any Donation Request 54 98 44 81%

Donation Request for Featured Products 21 47 26 124%

Countries 8 24 16 200%

Existing Organization Members (submitted entries) 27 59 32 119%

Existing Individual Members (any TSDigs involvement) n/a 411 n/a n/a

ONLINE EVENTS

Webinar/NPLIVE attendees 1263 911 -352 -28%

Submissions 22 31 9 41%

1st Time Registration 5 11 6 120%

1st Time Ordering Orgs 6 7 1 17%

Any Donation Request 16 61 45 281%

Total TechSoup Members involved in TSDigs 2012 (individuals) – 458Total TechSoup Members involved in TSDigs 2012 (organizations) – 388

Event DatesDigital Storytelling ChallengeCommunity VotingTSDigs Awards Screening/Party

Feb 1 – 29, 2012March 6 – 11, 2012March 28, 2012 Participants

Tweet Chat 1 Mobile Storytelling Jan 31, 2012 35 People

224 Tweets

Webinar 1 Pre-Production: Before You Push Record Feb 2, 2012 541 Registered

348 Attended

Tweet Chat 2 Creating Impact & Effective Storytelling Feb 7, 2012 53 People

425 Tweets

Nonprofits Live Collaborative Storytelling Feb 8, 2012 75 Registered

138 Attended

Webinar 2 Production: Capturing Your Story on Camera Feb 9, 2012 455 Registered

247 Attended

Tweet Chat 3 Social Amplification & Distribution Feb 14, 2012 42 People

289 Tweets

Webinar 3 Post-Production: You Have Footage, Now What? Feb 16, 2012 509 Registered

241 Attended

Social Media2012 Jan 31, 2012 Feb 29, 2012 Mar 31, 2012 Difference %Change

Facebook Likes

5,451 5,698 5,966 515 9%

Twitter Followers

13,401 13,926 14,498 1097 8%

2011 Jan 1, 2011 Jan 31, 2011 Feb 28, 2011 Difference %Change

Facebook Likes

2,877 3,080 3,248 371 9%

Twitter Followers

7592 8026 8427 835 9%

Twitter

Top Days TSDigs Mentions Event

Feb 7, 2012 537 Tweet Chat 2 (Creating Impact/Effective Storytelling)

Feb 14, 2012 375 Tweet Chat 3 (Social Amplification)

Jan 31, 2012 270 Tweet Chat 1 (Mobile Storytelling)

March 28, 2012 207 TSDigs Awards Screening

Total TSDigs Mentions 2,902 Breakdown of Total Tweets

Retweets 1,377 47%

@TechSoup Mentions 962 33%

Includes Link 1,452 50%

No Link 1,452 50%

#TSDigs

Total Posts @techsoup digital story-telling

storytelling challenge

digital digital story tweet chat 11am pt -

500 1,000 1,500 2,000 2,500 3,000 3,500

2,902

1,350

528 392 678 630

166 121

Top Keywords & Frequency Within Posts1/

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Twitter Posts & ImpressionsTotal Posts Potential ImpressionsImpressions

Twitter + Community

Community Guest Tweeting

New way to involve and showcase partners and experts.

Guest HostingCoordinated with #commbuild chat to host storytelling themed chat during TSDigs and

TechSoup was the guest host.

Insights

• TweetChats still proved to be a good way to promote TSDigs and engage participants.• No significant difference in rate of growth of social channels. Perhaps next year look at

ads or specific ways to drive subscribers. • This year more focused on tweet chat theme and inviting topic professionals, vs. last

year having guest expert. Both work.• Kept time to 11am to match the webinars, which was good for simplicity, but next year

would like to look at co-organizing with global partners or participating in at least one different time to support broader geographic participation.

• Guest tweeting Thursday turned out to be a great way for us to involve and showcase Lights. Camera. Help. even more and was positively received by the community and person guest tweeting.

FacebookCountriesUnited StatesCanadaEstoniaUnited KingdomIndiaAustraliaRomania

CitiesSan FranciscoNew York, NYWashington DCLos AngelesOaklandChicagoTallinn, Harjumaa, Estonia

Demographics59% Female39% Male73% 25 – 54 y.o.

Talking about TechSoup2,709: Engaged61,678: Mentions

Total Reach (Based on Unique/Day)

137,242

Insights

• Users seem to be more social media savvy and saw we were tagged more in posts.

• Skewed 20% more female, last year was closer to 50/50. • Social media seems to be reflective of offline TechSoup presence – San

Francisco represented highest, and global partners Australia and Romania in top 10 countries.

• We did not place ads this year, and still had the comparable growth rate.

Post-Event Survey(135 Responses)

How did you hear about TSDigs? What was your involvement with TechSoup before TSDigs?

Email continues to be number one way people learn about TSDigs/events.

13% Learned about TechSoup through TSDigs.16% New Members26% Received donated products

TechSoup Newsletter or Email (eg, By the Cup, New Product Alerts)

Email

Friend

Twitter

Facebook

SecondLife

Other Newsletter or Listserve

Specific site or person (so we can thank them!)

TSDigs Google Group

Lights. Camera. Help.

Blog

Community Listserve (eg, YNPN, Progressive Exchange, etc.)

LinkedIn

Longtime memberHave received donated productParticipated in events or webinarsNew member (within the last few months)Just learned about TechSoup from TSDigsDidn't attend or participate in TSDigs, but interested in par-ticipating in the futureAttended the TSDigs Awards Screening in SecondLifeAttended the TSDigs Awards Screening in San FranciscoWatched the TSDigs Awards Screening Livestream

Post-Event SurveyAfter participating in the Digital Storytelling event, how likely are you to use the tools again?

Definitely 43%Very likely 39%

Maybe, but need more practice or training 18%Not very 1%

What was the best or most helpful part of the TSDigs Challenge?*

Webinars 42%Exposure on TechSoup 33%Prizes 22%How-To articles and blogs 22%Forums 4%Tweet Chats 4%

SecondLife meetings & interviews 3%

How or where will you use/share your digital story?

Website 75%

Facebook 64%

Fundraising 44%

Twitter 28%

Recruiting 19%

Would you participate in TSDigs Challenge again?

Yes, probably 39%

Yes, definitely 36%

Not sure 15%

No, not likely 10%

Before TSDigs, had you created a digital story before?

No, this was our first time 41%

Yes, once or twice 24%

Yes, a few times (3-5) 22%

Yes, a lot (more than 5) 13%

Who created/produced your story?

Staff 64%Volunteer 21%

Volunteer (Film Professional) 7%Intern(s) 5%Hired someone 4%

*Survey sent to 1000+ who participated in any part of TSDigs (webinar, entered digital story, tweet chat, forum, judge, etc.). Percentages based on 135 who answered. Results are a good sampling, but should not be used as only indicator of effectiveness of certain TSDigs features/programs (eg, SecondLife/Nonprofit Commons).

Suggestions/Comments(from post-event survey)

“The learning opportunities were very helpful. More great trainings please!”

“More webinars on how to get best content.”

“I love Tech Soup, but often I don't feel like I can take full advantage of all it has to offer due to too much to do, too little time.”

“The promotion to enter the contest was great and staff responded quickly. The screening went well. The contest website, layout and voting system needs

improvement.”

Kudos

"Thank you for this opportunity. Kids love making videos!"-Los Alamitos Youth Center, Inc.

"Thanks for having the contest! This was very much a learning process for me. It was my first time using this video

editing software."-National Forest Foundation

"Thank you so much for motivating us to tell and share our

story with the world!"-Starfire Council

Thank you!

-Online Community & Social Media Team