Source: Planning experiments to build membership

Date
Author
SolSeed archive migration
Comment
Create maintainable Markdown archive revision
Size
1973 bytes
Delta
This was a session at [Sol 2013](/Sol_2013).

### Participants
- [Brandon](/Brandon) (convener)
- [Ben](/Ben)
- [Eric](/Eric)

### Discussion
- Project ideas
  - Spend $5 on a combination of AdWords (at 5 cents a click) that would be attractive and specifically targeted at us
    - Start by having a simple webpage that describes the [SolSeed Movement](/SolSeed_Movement) and has a Join Us button
    - Then hire a graphic designer to articulate our vision and direct the ads to that webpage
    - See how many people click the Join Us button on the webpage
    - Hypothesis: If we can reach the right people, we can get them on board without having to go through a long funnel of engagement
    - Try including a "No thanks" button that takes you to a list of possible reasons why, and/or a comment field for them to explain why
  - Create prettier ads with images
    - Example: "When you hear 'freefall,' do you think" (graph of stock market crash) "or" (floating astronaut)
    - Possibly a second phase of the above idea where we optimize the ads that point to the webpage
    - Experiment with variations on the wordsmithing
  - Paper advertising in Portland?
    - Possible hypothesis: We can get people to try out an event at the [Seed Village](/Seed_Village)
    - Playbill style or a sheet with tearoff strips?
  - Optimize the entry point through the Earthseed page on Wikipedia?
  - Get Freeman Dyson to advertise us?

- Learning should be cheap in both time and money
  - Brandon would like to get to the point where we're doing at least one experiment a day
  - Ben is worried about experiments that last hours to a day being not as useful per unit time

- WWWs (by next work bee call)
  - Eric: Propose a description for the first test webpage
  - Ben: Propose a set of AdWords that have high enough search volume (using the [Google Keyword tool](https://adwords.google.com/o/KeywordTool)) and are pointed in our direction
  - Brandon: Set up the analytics