ADD2551 Talk London Procurement of a Mailchimp specialist agency

1.1. Talk London is City Hall’s online community, which supports the Mayor and the GLA in placing Londoners’ needs at the centre of its strategies and programmes. It does so by involving citizens in meaningful research, debate and consultation about how to improve the capital.

1.2. Talk London has over 61,000 members, and has delivered most of City Hall’s online consultations – from clean air and housing to health inequalities, economic development and the recovery from COVID-19, at no cost to policy teams. The Talk team has also worked on consultations with MOPAC and the London Fire Commissioner. We have demonstrated that the development of compelling, accessible and highly shareable content has the capacity to drive huge audience reach and engagement.

1.3. The Talk London website was relaunched in 2021 with increased functionality (under MD2720 and MD2535). Londoners are encouraged to take part and have their say on Talk London via surveys, discussions and idea-generation activities. There is also the functionality to provide background information to users.

1.4. All engagement activity on Talk London is launched via email to Talk London members. Talk London is the first team in the GLA moving over to a new email service provider, Mailchimp. As well as Mailchimp having more user-friendly email templates for Talk London members, we anticipate achieving a number of efficiencies, from both automation of several emails in the Talk London member user journey, and less manual segmentation. We wish to undertake a procurement to appoint a specialist agency to help us with planning and strategy, integration with the Drupal website, training, and implementation, up to the value of £25,000. This procurement will be conducted in accordance with the GLA’s Contracts and Funding Code.

2.1. The objective is to commission a specialist agency to support the Talk London team with the strategy and planning, integration, internal training, and implementation of the move to Mailchimp.

2.2. The expected outcomes are:

• Talk London, as the pilot team, successfully transitions to using Mailchimp and achieves efficiencies through the successful automation of certain parts of the Talk London member user journey
• increased email and on-site engagement metrics
• other teams from the GLA can have confidence migrating to Mailchimp as a new email service provider.
  

3.1. Under section 149 of the Equality Act 2010, the Mayor and the GLA are subject to the public sector equality duty and must have due regard to the need to:

• eliminate unlawful discrimination, harassment and victimisation
• advance equality of opportunity between people who share a relevant protected characteristic and those who do not
• foster good relations between people who share a relevant protected characteristic and those who do not.

3.2. The “protected characteristics” are age, disability, gender reassignment, pregnancy and maternity, race, religion or belief, sex, sexual orientation, and marriage/ civil partnership status. The duty involves having appropriate regard to these matters as they apply in the circumstances, including having regard to the need to: remove or minimise any disadvantage suffered by those who share or is connected to a protected; take steps to meet the different needs of such people; and encourage them to participate in public life or in any other activity where their participation is disproportionately low. This can involve treating people with a protected characteristic more favourably than those without one.

3.3. Through more efficient use of Talk London member segments in Mailchimp – incorporating both manual targeting and automated emails – we can more efficiently target user groups who have not interacted with our content, and promote participation to a broad range of Londoners. This will have a beneficial impact on protected groups under the above Act.

Key risks

4.1. A key risk is that the Talk London team will not be able to set up the integrations in order to achieve maximum efficiencies achievable through Mailchimp integration with the Drupal website. Only agencies that have Mailchimp expertise and can advise on integrations will be considered.

Links to Mayoral strategies and priorities

4.2. The Mayor has stated he wants to lead the most engaged and transparent administration seen at City Hall. The Talk London community, through online engagement activities, primarily launched through email, allows Londoners to participate in the design, development and delivery of strategies, policies, and programmes.

Consultations and impact assessments, including data protection

4.3. The Talk London privacy policy is compliant with the Data Protection Act 2018 and the EU General Data Protection Regulation.

Conflicts of interest

4.4. There are no known potential or perceived conflicts of interest from any of those involved in the drafting or clearance of this form.

5.1. Assistant Director’s approval is sought for expenditure of up to £25,000 for the services of an agency specialising in Mailchimp, to support the Talk London team in the transition over the coming six to 10 months.

5.2. The expenditure is expected to span two financial years: where approximately £5,000 will be incurred in 2021-22 and the remaining up to £20,000 in 2022-23. This expenditure is to be funded from the Talk London’s 2021-22 and 2022-23 budget, held within the City Intelligence Unit that is part of Strategy and Communications Directorate. Talk London Team within City Intelligence unit will be responsible for managing the contract of the agency specialising in Mailchimp.

6.1. The contract will be managed by the Talk London team.

6.2. TfL Procurement has been consulted and advised that this work can be procured through a request for quotation process. Procurement will commence as soon as is practicable following this decision.