Strategic Communications

If you’re running for a local office, you probably won’t be giving speeches every day, but you will inevitably have a few moments where all eyes are on you. These may be your campaign kickoff, that first big "meet the candidate" night, or the party on election night.

So, what do you say? How do you connect with the audience, lay out your vision, and engage them without sounding robotic?

Well, it’s easier than you think. You don't need to reinvent the wheel. There’s a classic, five-step framework speechwriters have used for decades to build strong, powerful, and authentic speeches.

When planning for an independent expenditure, it’s critical to avoid common mistakes that can drain your budget or even backfire. A strong independent expenditure program should be strategic, compliant with the law, and designed to complement–not harm–your favored candidate. 

Here are three areas to look out for to set yourself and your independent expenditure up for success. 

What information independent expenditure (IE) campaigns can use depends on who you ask, and what set of laws you’re covered by. In recent years, you may have seen candidate campaigns that appear to bend over backward to make photos and b-roll videos publicly available on their website (a classic example of this being “McConnelling,” which went viral in 2014). Why? What are voters going to do with all this stuff? Well, it turns out that in most cases, the audience isn’t the run-of-the-mill voter at all. These campaigns may instead be trying to make information publicly available for independent expenditure campaigns to use.

Here at The Campaign Workshop, we have written a lot about independent expenditure strategy in the past, but the key takeaways never change:

1. Know your goals.
2. Do no harm.
3. Don’t duplicate efforts.

An essential component of a good political communication strategy is the integration of effective speechwriting. Even if your campaign doesn’t plan to deliver a ton of speeches, it’s crucial to have a structured process in place for crafting and refining them.

If you’re running for office even at the local level, chances are you’ll want to have a speech prepared at least for Election Night. If the thought of writing a speech seems intimidating, don’t panic–you can follow a simple and straightforward method to create impactful speeches.