Title: 7D4H Mid-Campaign Report Card!
As we pass the mid-year mark of the 7D4H campaign, we feel it is important to step back and reflect on the successes and sticky points of the campaign. After all, it’s all about learning.
With that in mind, the following pie charts show a month to month distribution of blogs wrote, number of guest blogs, total Facebook shares and total Twitter shares. These numbers only reflect the first five months of the campaign, through the end of May.
One important thing to note is that after the first three months of the campaign, starting in April, we limited the blog from daily to weekly. We believed this would give more “air time” to our guest bloggers and would also direct traffic to be more centralized around guest bloggers blogs. Additionally, it was difficult for our small team to keep up with daily postings for the campaign.
In total, as of the end of May, we had 99 blogs wrote, 31 guest bloggers, 141 Twitter Shares and 4,781 Facebook Shares. On average, each blog gets between 3,000 - 5,000 hits.
Geographically, we have bloggers writing to us from all over the world. Nationally, we’ve received blogs from: Washington, Massachusetts, Colorado, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Florida, Texas, Georgia, Minnesota, Louisiana, New York. Internationally we’ve received blogs from: United States of America, India, Guatemala, Israel, Nigeria, Malawi, Russia & South Africa.
Here are a few important trends we’ve noticed:
- Narratives that are written from a first person perspective gain the most traction
- Blogs that are both education and are based with humor tend to succeed
- The network of the guest blogger matters substantially as they support blogs in distribution
- Coalition campaigns tend to do very well (see One Heart for Lorraine, by Isabel Kumwembe, linked below), where an entire community is mobilized to stand in solidarity
- More than anything, blogs that are succinct and informative really resonate with others
From the guest blogs written, the cause distribution is:
HIV/AIDS - 1
Mental Health - 5
Nutriton - 4
Heart Disease - 2
Maternal Child Health - 4
Disability - 10
Cancer - 5
At first it was very difficult to get people to write as guest bloggers for mental health, but once we had our first brave blogger, Cait Brogan, several other people started to share their narratives.
We’ve had an enormous outpouring of support and blogs from the Friedrich’s Ataxia community around disability, in particular.
We’ve also had a couple of stand-out super star guest bloggers and blogs. Our top four most shared blogs are, and authors are (drum roll, please):
#1) Sarah Gelbard: Disability - Eggs & Bacon
#2) Liam Dougherty: We Are All Lovely Avocados
#3) Isabel Kumwembe: One Heart for Lorraine
#4) Paul Dufrene: Disability - Music - Choice - Disability
Overall, it’s been a successful first half of the campaign and we greatly look forward to continuing the conversation! Thank you to all of our guest bloggers and social sharers who have been following and spreading the word. Your support, and your voice, are both invaluable.
Call to action: Do you have important information around one of our seven causes: HIV/AIDS, Mental Health, Nutrition, Heart Disease, Maternal Child Health, Cancer, Disability, that you want to share with a wider audience? Do you or a loved one currently live and/or struggle with one of these causes? Do you work in research, advocacy, prevention, treatment or care? We want to hear from YOU! Write to us today: 7dresses@artsconnectinternational.org to become a featured blog writer. Another way to get involved is to wear the color of the day in solidarity. Take a picture of yourself in the color of the day and Tweet it @ArtsConnectInt, tag us on Instagram @ArtsConnectInt, or send it to us on Facebook.
Campaign Update (2017): All 7 Dresses 4 Health blogs were migrated from a former site, so the sharing analytics are inconsistent from when they were first published. We apologize to our guest bloggers, and readers, for this inconvenience. That said, the campaign garnered an average of 5K hits per blog, over 500,000 readers throughout 2015! Additionally, the average number of shares per guest blog was over 150x on social media (through Facebook and Twitter). Thank you for making this incredible campaign possible - and for all that it was for so many. With gratitude, Marian & the ACI Team
About 7 Dresses 4 Health (7D4H): 7D4H is a year-long arts and health education campaign lead by visual artist, Marian Brown, in conjunction with Arts Connect International. The objective of the campaign is to promote inclusive community practices through adDRESSing health artistically and collaboratively. To learn more about the genesis of the project, read Marian’s New Year Blog.
About this week's look & location: All of the dresses for 7 Dresses 4 Health were designed and sewn by Kim's Fashion Design. Love the look? Visit Kim at 100 Huntington Ave, Boston MA 02116, call her at (617) 267-9299 or email her: info@kimsfashion.com. Mention 7 Dresses 4 Health for a special discount!
