American Film Institute

American Film Institute logo

"AFI has had a Web site since 1995, but we found it difficult to effectively connect this online presence to our broad media programming offline, on TV and, especially, to communications with individual constituents until we began to use Convio's platform and services. With the help of Convio's CSS team, 'AFI's 100 Years…100 Movies' 10th Edition campaign was fully integrated, resulting in outstanding house file growth and improved service to our supporters."

- Anna Marie Piersimoni, Director, Internet Communications, American Film Institute

About the American Film Institute

AFI is a national institute providing leadership in screen education and the advancement and celebration of excellence in the art of film, television and digital media. AFI trains the next generation of filmmakers at its world-renowned Conservatory, maintains America's film heritage through the AFI Catalog of Feature Films, and explores new digital technologies in entertainment and education through the AFI Digital Content Lab and K-12 Screen Education Center.

The Challenge The Solution Results
  • Needed online tools and supporting consulting services that could improve AFI's Web presence, increase brand awareness, and drive online registrations
  • Needed to integrate various forms of media to accelerate email list growth, especially to leverage an existing large broadcast television audience for the successful 10-year running "AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies" program
  • Needed to promote a broad range of diverse program activity, including AFI's 40th anniversary and its "AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies" campaign
  • Wanted to cultivate relationships with new registrants in a way that increased their ongoing involvement and interactions with AFI
  • Selected Convio's fundraising, events and DataSync solutions
  • Integrated online efforts with offline media, including TV, to drive traffic to AFI's Web site
  • With strategy consulting and interactive services provided by Convio's Client Success Services (CSS) team, created effective online campaigns including microsites that supported key initiatives and events related to AFI television programs and 40th anniversary
  • Developed a "Welcome" email series, with messaging tailored by region to improve cultivation efforts
  • Able to test the success rate of different messages, images and appeals and continually refine AFI's communications
  • Segmentation capabilities make it easy to send follow-up messages to event registrants, providing them with additional details and updates
  • Added more than 200,000 new registrants with email addresses to AFI's database, bringing the total number of valid email addresses to over 260,000
  • Daily registration rate peaked at more than 700 users per day during the 3 months that followed event promotions; now remains steady at 100 users per day
  • Increased brand awareness through integrated marketing that combined multiple channels
  • Improved value of Web site content including interactive components, such as blogs and downloads, which leveraged overall stickiness, average length of visit, and number of pages visited