Identifying, recruiting and retaining volunteers is a constant challenge for local public health departments, and Bio-Defense Network has just successfully completed a social media campaign to reach younger volunteers in the St. Louis bi-state region by attracting nearly 100 new Medical Reserve Corps members.
Built on a foundation of Facebook advertising, the campaign included the creation of a series of targeted advertisements aimed at having younger people “like” a new Gateway Volunteer Network Facebook page and sign up to learn more about one of the nine MRC units in the region. When a potential member asked for more information, their contact information was sent to the appropriate MRC unit, which undertook the follow-up. Because membership qualifications differ from county to county and state to state, the specific response varied.
Several varied advertising approaches were used, and continually refined to generate the most responses, and connections. Zip codes and medical and nursing school affiliations were used to reach the most receptive audience.
There are several advantages of using social media advertising. The first is cost. This campaign paid just $2,000 for the actual advertising (not including the fees to create and change the ads.) That expenditure allowed the campaign to reach nearly 30,000 targeted people, and resulted in more than 650 page “likes” and 98 form completions in less than three months. Forms were completed by individuals expressing their interest in learning more about membership in a Medical Reserve Corps. Many of those people will join an MRC, but in addition, the effort created widespread awareness in the community.
In addition to the reasonable costs, social media advertising allowed us to identify ads that worked, and improve them; and remove those ads that didn’t move people to take action. Percentage of “clicks” can be tracked for each ad, so ads that received fewer clicks were quickly discarded. This continuous “massaging of the message” drove the success of the campaign.