During the 2024 holiday season, Oakland School launched a strategic email campaign to further connect with its community and boost fundraising efforts. From November 7th to December 23rd, we created a series of eight eye-catching, content-driven emails geared toward alumni, parents, and community members. The campaign’s goal was twofold: share exciting updates about the school’s growth and achievements, and encourage financial donations.
The emails featured impactful photography and newly filmed videos to highlight the school’s vibrant community and daily student activities. All communications were thoughtfully crafted with a clear strategic plan in mind, balancing the need to build community investment with making direct asks. The email schedule alternated between content that nurtured engagement and connection within the community, and targeted emails that included a link to Oakland’s giving page.
We leveraged Mailchimp’s segmentation tools to curate a targeted email list. The list was built by importing existing data, including alumni and parent contacts, and collecting new addresses through events and inquiry forms. This list enabled the campaign to reach a larger audience, including those overlooked in past outreach efforts.
Over the course of the campaign, Oakland saw an increase in engagement across several metrics. Open rates increased by 4.7% compared to the previous year, and click-through rates surged by 77.3%, indicating recipients were actively engaging with the content. Notably, the unsubscribe rate decreased by 47.8%, reflecting the improved relevance and engagement of the content.
