1. Three steps to improve your campaign's
volunteer program
1. Define your volunteer roles
Sample Volunteer Roles
canvass
People will want to help, but they need to know what they can do. Tell them what you need. Be
creative, and think about a wide variety of skill sets and levels. Campaigns generally settle on
between 5 and 10 options.
• One time events
• Based solely on campaign needs
• Controlled by staff
• Recorded on six version of a spread
sheet
• Multiple events over time
• Consideration for volunteer skills,
interests
• Significant volunteer input
• Combined with full database
engagement data.
Old way New way
The next step is to rank them from easiest to most difficult. The flow from easy to difficult will help
determine future communication with volunteers--you will track where people are on the path and
strategically encourage them to take the next step. Approaching volunteer positions in this strategic
way is a new approach that takes full advantage of the NationBuilder platform.
Volunteers
host a house party/fundraiser be a social media ambassador write an op-ed
help with video/graphic design make phone bank calls write for the website etc.

2. 3. Follow up with everyone
Now you’ve got a system for recruiting volunteers and making sure nobody falls through the cracks.
The most important step of an integrated volunteer program comes next: move people along the
path of engagement. This means determining where a person is based on their past actions and
encouraging them to take the appropriate next step down the path.
2. Create a signup page
Next, create a volunteer signup page where people can tell you which role(s) they are willing to fill.
The signup page will show visitors a scrolling list of past signups, building social proof into the
volunteer process to encourage more people to take action. The key, then, to setting yourself up for
success is to build the page in such a way that none of your volunteers fall through the cracks.
First, make sure that someone is in charge of managing the relationship with each volunteer. You
can set this up in the system by assigning your volunteer coordinator as “point person” for each
volunteer. You can assign point people in the volunteer page settings.
Next, make a searchable record of who wants to do what. You can do this by marking the volunteer’s
profile with a “tag” based on what they volunteer to do. This will come in handy later, as you can
target an email blast at everyone in your database who has a particular tag.
Finally, set up reminders for your volunteer coordinator. For example, you might want to remind your
coordinator to send a thank you email (or text!) to everyone who fills out the volunteer form. We call
those reminders “followups” and here’s how you can set them up on volunteer pages. This type of
reminder is invaluable in making sure that staffers keep in timely contact with supporters. It makes a
big difference: the 2012 Obama campaign found that when staffers reached out to volunteers within
72 hours, those volunteers were significantly more likely to take additional actions.
Sample follow ups
• see who pledged to volunteer but didn’t follow through. Reach out to them and offer other
opportunities to help out
• find repeat volunteers and offer additional opportunities/responsibilities
• identify talented volunteers and feature their success in a recruitment email to potential
volunteers

3. 1-213-394-4623 • info@nationbuilder.com • www.nationbuilder.com
• connect your social accounts to your database, find anyone who regularly retweets or likes your
posts, and invite them to volunteer
• email your supporters and ask them to recruit volunteers
• build a leaderboard to track supporters, volunteers, and recruiters and reward the highest
performers
Also, consider using this same principle to identify potential volunteers
Because NationBuilder tracks engagement history, you’re able to
track and reward good volunteers, recruit new volunteers, and move
people along a path of engagement.