RMT is a progressive, democratic and highly professional trade union, with more than 80,000 members. Members are from almost every sector of the transport industry - from the mainline and underground railways, shipping and offshore, buses and road freight. In August 2013 RMT and NetXtra launched a new website www.rmt.org.uk in order to meet the demands and requirements of a very diverse audience. To further RMT’s digital improvement program and enable RMT to reach out to their audience better, the development of a native mobile application was the next strategic step.

Impact

In the first week of launch RMT saw a staggering result with:

• 5000+ downloads
• 9000+ sessions recorded
• 3.17 sessions per device.
• 4.0 average app store rating.

Updated figures – 2 months after launch:

• 6000+ downloads
• 4.79 weekly sessions per device
• 4.2 average app store rating

The app can be directly linked with significant uplift in number of followers on RMT's social networking channels. It has also contributed to increases in monthly average web and newsletter engagements. 

New subscribers to the newsletter:

• Pre app: avg 50 per month
• Post app: avg of 116 per month
• Increase of 132%

Web traffic – visits to Union ‘join online’ page:

• Pre app: avg 2,500 per month
• Post app: avg of 10,000 per month
• Increase of: 300%

The RMT have also been able to test the push notification functionality and it’s been very successful achieving a 12.9% open rate against an average open rate of 7.8*

Goals

• To connect with a wider audience
• Increase union appeal to a younger audience
• Provide members and activists with access to important information
• Promote events and campaigns
• Push information to users
• Increasing the value of membership
• Improving access to and shareability of content with audience appropriate, prioritised messaging
• Engaging with prospective members
• Increasing brand awareness and alignment with contemporary communication methods

Solution

The application of this innovative technology has cemented the position of the RMT as being a forward thinking, member focused Union. The new integrated app is designed to mobilise the RMT union members by including the following features:

• Biometric functionality: through thumbprint and face recognition – currently login but future use for signing petitions, voting and supporting campaigns.
• Campaigns: The app displays current campaigns and allows the user to ‘Take Action’ – this feature is used by RMT to add petition links via the CMS which the user can access by pressing the green ‘Take Action’ but in the app. The app also allows users to save campaigns – if the user is a registered member, their saved campaigns will be also accessible via the website.
• Push notifications of:
• invitations and reminders of attendance for events booked along with syncing booked events/meetings to the devices calendar
• Member surveys to members, increasing response rate and helping to strengthen their organisations credentials to lobby Government for change
• petitions, applications and vote requests to members devices new content added to their registered interest (e.g. if user is interested in Rail News
• content, when RMT pushes via the CMS a new article tagged with ‘Rail’, the user gets a notification on their device.

• Members area: The app members area allows members to have quick access to RMT contact information as well as their branch secretary. The app can direct users to their phone or email app to carry on with the support interaction. From this area user can also update their contact details (personal and employment details). Users can also set their notifications settings, enable or disable face/touch ID, and set their topic interests (RMT industries).

Moving Forwards

In its first week the RMT mobile app exceed expectations and there are already future updates planned which will extend to the launch of a digital membership card, remote voting and other value-added features for members.

The NetXtra member engagement app integrates with existing CMS and CRM systems to populate the interface with content relevant to the member and pushes data provided by the member back into the CRM to augment records. This data driven approach saves organisations valuable resources and optimises the investment in existing systems, content and communications strategies and enables a wider and more immediate connection with members.