We Won’t Be Silenced – Google Paid Search and PMAX campaign
Jodi Westrick, Colleen Sibthorp, Programming Staff
In the wake of public media’s loss of federal funding, Michigan Public ran various campaigns to ensure our members that we weren’t going anywhere, but their support was needed. For our end-of-year campaign, we knew we wanted to try something a bit different and experiment on some new-to-us platforms. We worked with our partners at the Allegiance-Pursuant Group to experiment with using a Google PMAX and Search campaign, which uses AI technology to serve on cohesive campaign across Search, YouTube, Gmail, Maps, Display and Discovery platforms on Google.
For our campaign, we used both photos and video, as well as compelling written messages that localized NPR’s “We Won’t Be Silenced” messaging, bringing forward a diverse set of voices from our hosting and reporting staffs. In these messages, we appealed to listeners and potential donors about protecting the First Amendment and ensuring organizations like ours would continue to not just operate, but thrive. This matched some premium gifts we were offering, which included T-shirts, water bottles, and hats with “I support the First Amendment” messaging.
The campaign was a modest spend over the course of nearly a month and a half. From it, we raised upwards of $38,000, seeing engagement from 180 donors. Our return on ad spend was 11 times the benchmark for public media and the average gift was over $200. Additionally, a major goal for us in 2025 was to build up our new member portfolio, and 23% of those who donated through this campaign were first-time donors.
Beyond its success, this campaign helped us imagine additional ways to engage with our listener base and pushed our own limits in our digital fundraising efforts. It has inspired us to replicate this work in other areas of our station as well.
