In my 20 years working in politics, I have seen a lot of things change. Technology in particular has done a lot to change the way that we communicate with voters. Yet somehow, we in politics have access to more information about our audience than ever before, but our audience engagement is at an all time low.
That’s because politics relies on the same tools we always have: TV, radio, door-to-door, mail and now digital ads. Campaigns are missing an important piece of the puzzle: content marketing.
Your nonprofit facebook ad will need an image to display on users newsfeeds or right-hand rails. In a platform like Facebook, where viewers are accustomed to scrolling continuously, you’re going to need an image that is arresting enough to stop the scroll. Make sure the photo or illustration you use has a clear focal point that is either intriguing or easily recognizable and relevant to a viewer’s interests. If you sell shoes, pick your snazziest pair, put them on a clean background that shows them off. If you’re running for office, you could use an image of a local landmark or a picture of a well-known person who is endorsing you. Whatever image you choose, make sure it is arresting, and communicates something important about you, your cause, or your business.
How Democrats Can Jumpstart Their Campaigns for the Future
Races are heating up, but there are a number of exciting opportunities for Democrats up and down the ticket. Here are some tips to jumpstart your Democratic campaign:
1. Do a thorough self-assessment. Are you ready to run? Does your family support you? Does your community support you? Have you done your politics? These are important questions to ask and know the answer to before you even file to run. If you can confidently answer, “yes” to these questions, you are ready to jumpstart your campaign.
2. Plan, plan, plan! The biggest mistake a candidate can make is failing to create a campaign plan. Your campaign plan should include a vote goal, budget, timeline, and message. Campaigns themselves are living, breathing animals once they heat up, but your campaign plan should pretty much stay the same.
3. Focus on the right stuff. It’s really easy to get caught up in the back and forth of a heated race and allow that to throw you off course. The best Democratic campaigns stay focused on directly communicating their message with targeted voters and turning them out. Period. Everything else is just noise.
4. Do the work. Running for office is hard. Doing what it takes to win is often even harder. Spending hours on the phone, asking for money every single day, is tough. Knocking on every targeted voters door is exhausting. But this is usually what it takes to win. The best way to jumpstart your campaign is to embrace the work and lean into it. You’re probably running because you want to represent your community—use this time to get to know them and ask them to join your campaign.
This four part webinar series will cover advocacy topics ranging from digital ad buying, developing a winning advocacy strategy, and goal setting for digital advertising campaigns. The first webinar in the series will be on content marketing for advocacy campaigns.
Negative Keywords Can Help Prevent a Whole Lot of Confusion
Do you know what a negative keywords are? As anyone who has ever used Google can attest, what comes up in your search is not always relevant to what you were actually looking for. Negative keywords are very specific words or phrases that you want to block from your target keyword list in an ad campaign to ensure that your ads will not be shown around those specific words. These words often share grammatical similarities to keywords you would like to target, but have a vastly different meaning.
Advocacy strategies have changed a lot over the last 20 years. When I was a chief of staff in the New York State Legislature, I don't remember there ever being a real advocacy campaign around public support of an issue that focused on legislators. The main way groups moved legislation was to hire a lobbyist and that was really it. There were occasional print ads and lobby days, but day-to-day mass contact from constituents that were driven by member groups were few and far between. Today, we spend a lot of time running advocacy campaigns on the state level. Issue advocacy tactics that were once only used on large, federal issues are now seen on smaller federal issues as well as state and municipal issues.
Getting the Most Out of Your Non-Profit Board of Directors
Running a non-profit is not easy. but your non-profit board can help your organization go from drab to fab. Fully utilizing your non-profit board can make the difference between a sluggish or vibrant organization. Here are some tips to up your board's performance and give them a meaningful experience.
Open up Your Campaign Toolbox, What Will You Find?
We understand what it’s like to operate a campaign on a tight budget, so we’ve found some free tools to include in your campaign toolbox to help you along the way. We hope you will find them useful as you launch your campaign or look for ways to better organize it. to ve clear no campaign tool will solve all of your campaigns problems. Whether fundraising for a nonprofit, managing an independent expenditure campaign, or seeking office, a few of these tools will surely help you along your way.
Measuring Conversions Across Devices Using Facebook
Recently Facebook launched cross-device reporting for Facebook ads, which will help in measuring conversions of all of an individual's devices. We have grown beyond just using desktops. Now folks are using multiple devices and advertisers and publisher are adjusting to connect with consumers. Facebook's cross-device reporting enables advertisers to see how people are moving between devices before they convert into donors, supporters, volunteers, etc. Reaching supporters across multiple devices is incredibly important for digital advertising today and it’s not exactly groundbreaking that people are surfing the web on more than just their desktop computer. When you look specifically at Facebook, it’s even more apparent that people are checking their accounts on every device they have.
Hal Malchow Tells Us How Political Direct Mail in the Digital Age Is Still Relevant
Last week we released our first ebook: Political Direct Mail In The Digital Age. The book explains why with all the technology we have, political direct mail in the digital age is still relevant. We explain how you should decide on direct mail and targeted communications strategies for political and advocacy campaigns. We also discuss the cost of direct mail, micro-targeting strategies and how to use direct mail for GOTV.
Advocacy campaigns get inspired by GOTV. Get Out The Vote, has come a long way. A good GOTV program can give a political campaign a big lift and those tactics are now being used for advocacy. you can read more about GOTV techniques here and here. GOTV techniques have transcended their former use as “valued election tools”, and are now the core component of modern GOTV Tactics. They are being turned into engagement plans and are being used in advocacy, nonprofit organizing, and the corporate world.
Code for Progress Is Helping Make the Progressive Movement and the Tech Industry More Diverse
Last week, The Campaign Workshop hosted a interview training event for Code for Progress at our office that included a stellar cast of entrepreneurs, TCW staff, and an amazing group of fellows that are about to take the job market by storm.
Our team is made up of amazing creative, organizational, and political consulting talent committed to achieving political and advocacy goals. We have worked for candidates and causes, big and small, all across the country.
