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Green Party nets 35,000 signatures with grassroots email campaign
E-marketer ensures wide distribution for leadership-debate petition

Jan. 5, 2006 - GUELPH, ON: The Green Party of Canada has gathered more than 35,000 signatures on a petition for inclusion in the federal election debates, without knocking on one door. The party used the viral power of email and the expertise of a dedicated email-marketing firm to reach people who think the Greens deserve a place in the televised leaders' debates.

Green Party Executive Director Jean Langlois says email was the ideal medium for contacting supporters of the idea, who he says are spread across the country and aren't necessarily Green voters. "We needed to reach people regardless of their geographic location or party membership. This was a way for voters to express their hunger for better information upon which to make their voting decision."

To maximize the potential of their online campaign, the party turned to email marketing specialists at Inbox Marketer Inc. Inbox offered quick turnaround, launching the petition web site (www.info-greenparty.ca/petition) within a week of receiving final material from the party. Inbox hosted the web site and emailed an invitation to sign the petition to thousands of the party's contacts.

Inbox tracked open rates, click-through rates and who sent the message to friends, as well as whether the friends signed the petition. "We understood the importance of the viral aspect of the campaign," says Inbox account executive Sarah Haggerty, "so we designed the interface to allow recipients to forward the message to 20 friends." Inbox also tallied which election issues respondents felt were most important and allowed recipients to sign up for future mailings.

When Canadians sign the petition, a message indicating their support is automatically sent to the CTV, CBC, and Global television networks, as well as the Canadian Broadcast Standards Council, Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, and Canadian Association of Broadcasters. The final leadership debates are slated to air Jan. 9 and 10.

Langlois is optimistic that broadcasters will respond. "The broadcast consortium cannot in good conscience ignore the fact that already three times more people signed this petition than submitted questions to the networks for the debate."

Langlois also hopes to achieve a longer-term goal of ensuring that future debates include every party that receives at least 2% of the popular vote and/or is running a full slate of candidates. Meanwhile, the Green Party will use the data provided by Inbox to get a better understanding of its online community.

Langlois says email is a natural medium for the Green Party: "We are a grassroots organization so we make use of technology that empowers multidirectional grassroots communication, not just one-way broadcasting." He adds that outsourcing was more cost-effective than producing the email campaign in-house, especially during an election, when party staff is stretched.

About Inbox
Inbox Marketer Inc., based in Guelph, Ontario, is an email publishing company that builds electronic communities and strengthens client relationships. It does this by continuously fine-tuning the email dialogue that takes place between its customers and their clients, using proven direct marketing and publishing techniques.

Inbox expertise lies in email publishing, database marketing, lead generation and Web search engine optimization - skills it combines into effective marketing communications programs for private, public and not-for-profit organizations.

Contacts:
Sarah Haggerty, Account Executive
Inbox Marketer Inc.
Tel 519-824-6664
sarah@inboxmarketer.com
www.inboxmarketer.com

Jean Langlois, Executive Director
Green Party of Canada
Tel 613-562-4808
jlanglois@greenparty.ca
www.greenparty.ca
www.info-greenparty.ca/petition