Running a grassroots campaign is hard. There are always going to be grassroots volunteers who sign up for shifts and do not show up. That’s why when organizing an event, you can generally assume a 50% flake rate (percentage of grassroots volunteers who do not show up for their shift). More often than not, however, with the right coaxing, you can get a volunteer, who would have otherwise failed, to turn out for their shift. Below are a few suggestions to help you to mitigate your flake rate.

Before Election Day it’s important that you have a chance to test your campaign’s ground operation. After all, even the best-laid plans can go awry. Testing ensures that your organization can maintain its composure under pressure and gives you an opportunity to iron out any snags before the big day. The best way to test your operation is by creating an Election Day stress test that simulates your operation on the big day.

We teach a lot about research on campaigns, and most candidates see the benefits and try to make room in the budget for polling. But although many candidates will do research on their opponents, what many first time (and second and third time) candidates don’t do is get a self-research book done on themselves. Why one may ask, would I need research done on me? I know my background. Here are 3 reasons why self-research is much more important than it may seem.

Canvassing rural areas present a unique set of challenges. While you want to canvass as many homes in these areas as you can, as grassroots canvassing is the most effective method of volunteer voter contact, you also want to do so in a way that makes sense for both you and your canvassers. Below are a couple of suggestions for overcoming the challenges of rural canvassing:

Photos are a great way to enhance your communications. We work to use custom political photography and custom photo shoots for nonprofits and organizations whenever we can but based on budget and timing it is not always possible to do a shoot. So many time rights managed and royalty free photos are your only options.

These days, everyone is online. And if your nonprofit isn’t online, it should be! It’s easy, cheap and one of the best ways to stay engaged with your supporters. Here are five things we think every nonprofit should be doing online.

The advertising world is well-versed in using and exploiting the visual language of typography to convey messages that go beyond the overt, verbal language on the page Cal Swan, author of Language and Typography, says, “These two distinct areas often come together in practice as there is clearly a very strong relationship between the conception of the words as a message and their transmission in visible form.” Nowhere is this more important than in political messaging.

Over the last two Presidential election cycles, the Obama campaign has done some really innovative work online. There has been a lot of discussion in the progressive community about how other campaigns and organizations can take some of these tactics and apply them to their own causes.

Many times it is difficult to distinguish between what is considered political mail vs. election mail. Here’s a quick rundown of the differences between the two.

If you signed up for political email lists during the last election, you probably noticed a lot of email traffic. A lot. If, like a lot of us here at The Campaign Workshop, you were signed up for the political email lists of multiple candidates, campaign committees, advocacy organizations and more, you probably had an inbox flooded with emails. Which makes us wonder: is more political email better?