All -- we will not have a pop-up banner.
I know you want more insight into the trends: we will provide some of those
in our upcoming reports and metrics and we will plan to shift to a
quarterly cadence of a more specific metrics report that will include
fundraising.
Just to cover some basic trends: the last two years have significantly
changed our traffic composition. Regionally, we are seeing growth in
emerging languages and regions. This is great: people who need the
knowledge most, but cannot afford it and often live in countries where free
speech is criminalized are learning about Wikipedia. We need to keep
supporting that. In Europe, North America, Australia, etc. we see Wikipedia
becoming a part of the fabric of the internet itself: embedded in web
searches, operating systems, and other online resources. This is great too:
people get knowledge wherever they are. Both of those trends however can
make it more difficult to raise funds (and sometimes contribute), so we
have to make sure we adapt.
We are doing a lot of work around thinking through a diversified
fundraising strategy. That said, our main tool today are the site banners.
Just to be clear: the pop-up banner had advantages. It tested high with
readers, was only shown once to each user and cut the total number of
impressions needed by a factor of 7! We did hear your concerns however. The
Fundraising team listened and quickly integrated your feedback. While our
launch banner will be different from last year’s, it will not be a pop-up,
overlay content, or be sticky. As always this starting design will iterate
daily and have parallel tests, so you may see variations at any given time.
Megan Hernandez will send another email with more details about the process
to-date, and how best to communicate with Fundraising during the coming
month.
And in the spirit of the holidays I'd like to thank the fundraising team
for all of their hard work and to all of the volunteers who have helped
with the campaigns.
~~~~ Lila
On Mon, Dec 1, 2014 at 7:39 PM, MZMcBride <z(a)mzmcbride.com> wrote:
Ori Livneh wrote:
On Fri, Nov 28, 2014 at 5:55 PM, MZMcBride
<z(a)mzmcbride.com> wrote:
The banners may be effective, but they're not
aligned with Wikimedia's
values.
I wouldn't come out quite as strongly against these banners, but I share
the underlying sentiment.
What happened to "we make the Internet not suck"? What happened to the
near-universal agreement that pop-ups are bad?
(a) solicit input from a neutral reputation
management consultancy, and
Consultants are the reason the fundraising campaigns and associated
banners are so awful. To the idea that we continue paying people
needlessly for bad advice, I'm going to say no thank you. I'd rather not.
(b) create a forum for staffers to talk openly
about this matter, without
fear of reprisal
What's wrong with wikimedia-l? I can assure you that this mailing list has
grade-A reprisal, far better than what you'll receive from work. :-)
David Gerard wrote:
"Wikipedia begging for donations per usual.
"Advertising isn't evil"
they say as they throw a second nag at me as I scroll down."
https://twitter.com/enemyplayer/status/539180814739988481
Indeed. It might help if we started referring to the fundraising banners
as full-page advertising. Calling a spade a spade, and all that.
It also occurred to me that it wouldn't be unreasonable for Adblock (Plus)
to reconsider its classification of the fundraising notices (even
"banners" is generous). Historically banners on Wikimedia wikis have not
been considered ads by Adblock and friends, but this assumed decency and
common sense on Wikimedia's part. These full-page gremlins lack both.
Obnoxious banners *really do damage the brand*.
What are the fundraiser metrics? If they don't include effect on the
brand, they'll be motivating damaging behaviour.
We used to have live-updating statistics about the annual fundraiser at
<https://wikimediafoundation.org/wiki/Special:FundraiserStatistics>. That
error message is probably highly misleading and we really ought to have
better reporting about donations. As far as I know, we've taken several
steps backward in recent years in terms of donation transparency and this
should be addressed in 2015. (I'm somewhat hoping someone will quickly
prove me wrong with a link to up-to-date donor stats... go on!)
MZMcBride
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