Muscular Dystrophy Association

Replacing guesses with data

Throughout the year, MDA uses Meltwater to understand its brand visibility and awareness, replacing guesswork with comprehensive data. That comes in handy when the marketing team needs to confirm the power of the MDA brand. So as this iconic American brand approaches its 75th anniversary year, MDA wanted to understand its relevance and positioning in today’s competitive nonprofit space. They were able to test brand resonance against the numbers.

Using Media and Social Intelligence, the team discovered exactly the opposite of the rumor they heard. Brand visibility metrics and sentiment analysis data showed that MDA is still a beloved and trusted household name. 

That knowledge helps the marketing team shape its approach to its messaging with certainty. “We start out on the right foot with our community and enter the conversation where they are, as opposed to making an assumption and taking them down a course they don't need to go,” says MDA Chief Marketing Officer Morgan Roth. “They're cheerleading for us. They want to be on our team.”

Hitting campaigns out of the park

For the marketing team, knowing what resonates with MDA’s overlapping communities is key to creating campaigns and messaging that have impact. They use Meltwater to measure how their efforts land with their target audiences and understand why.

For the organization’s nationwide campaign for ALS Awareness Month each May, Media Monitoring and Media Relations gives the team real-time insight into how its marketing and PR efforts are paying off. That immediacy helped the marketing team expand the campaign in 2024 to include additional activations to recognize Lou Gehrig Day on June 2. Being able to monitor the new campaign as it progressed helped the team ensure it was on track to meet its visibility and fundraising goals. 

“We got that longed-for spike alert from Meltwater because we really did hit all the marks that we wanted to,” says Roth. “We were able to get the media coverage, communicate throughout our community, really get noticed, and have our message hit the targets that we were rooting to get.”

Once the campaign wrapped, the team was able to use reporting and benchmarking to understand how its social content, press releases, and other outputs impacted its visibility and engagement across markets. Those insights will help them ensure future campaigns hit their targets even more effectively.

Evolving solutions

As MDA has refined its approach to social marketing over the years, it has used Meltwater’s constantly improving technology to stay ahead of industry demands and trends. In 2024, that included ramping up its influencer marketing program with the Influencer Marketing solution. 

Built-in search, outreach, and campaign tracking tools make it easy for the team to scale its influencer marketing efforts throughout the year with seasonal and one-time campaigns. Plus, MDA’s Meltwater team keeps them in the know of product updates and improvements that can make their work even easier. “We're always aware of what's coming and what the Meltwater team is looking at so we can inform what the next iteration is going to look like down the road,” says Roth.