Ever wonder just how organizations like MoveOn structure their email alerts to make them as effective as possible? At a 2008 New Organizing Institute training in San Francisco, Ben Brandzel, former MoveOn.org Advocacy Director provided the following four rules for effective email alerts.  ONE/Northwest staffers Drew Bernard took notes and adapted his talk into this text.  Any wisdom is Ben's; any mistakes are ours.

Rule #1: Cut the fat

Keep alerts short and think like a reporter: put the most important stuff up top. Get rid of the wordy, patronizing "happy talk" that we all tend to start articles with.  See Jakob Nielsen's article "Writing Inverted Pyramids in Cyberspace" for more.

Rule #2: Track what works

Pay very close attention to what works and what doesn’t work. If an alert fails, don’t just assume it was an anomaly, figure out what was wrong with it and make the next one better.

Rule #3: Include a "Moment Story"

The first section of your email alert, before the action link, should be a Moment Story, which consists of three elements:

1. The “Cris-i-tunity”: a combination of crisis and opportunity: usually a reflection of something in the media or the opportunity for the campaign.
2. Reader-focused theory of change (RFTC): a chain of events that begins with the reader and ends with the crisis being happily resolved or opportunity has been achieved.  Ask yourself, "Am I telling a story about a chain of reaction that leads to success."
3. The Ask: the first action that will trigger the chain of events that you have just outlined in your reader-focused theory of change that will resolve the cris-i-tunity

The last thing to do is to look for weak spots.  You may find that some of it may be a stretch for your readers.  Some of it may not seem realistic or credible.  Edit until it does.

For example: Bush won’t actually back down on his global warming platform even if we flood him with emails.  You might want to include a historical example.  If you identify a weak spot in your RFTC to back up your point, then you might need to re-think your whole approach because it may not be compelling enough.

Rule #4: Include a "Movement Story"

The "Movement Story" is the part of your email in which you (briefly) recount the story of the movement that brought us to this opportunity for action.

The moment story draws you in; the movement story is what is going on.  Tell stories about what is going on and how we got to this moment.  Reflect back on the organization.  Be specific in the story you are telling.  Give people a story of success and that we are growing and getting better.

People often like to start their emails with the movement story.  This is natural, but wrong! Move it below the action link.