Campaigning

To adequately access the very large audience controlled by Google’s YouTube and other networks you must produce video content.

Perhaps you have noticed that Facebook is increasingly optimized for video content. And if you want to use tools like ads on premium on-demand video sites, you also need video content.

At this point, your Grandmother might be more likely to be on Facebook than your 18-year-old niece. They can both vote. So the idea that social media is just for young voters just isn’t borne out by the facts.

Young people are increasingly opting out of traditional cable and watch less and less traditional broadcast television, which means social and digital media are more and more vital for reaching voters under age 40. But that doesn’t mean older voters are not on social media or can’t be reached by digital channels.

According to the researchers at PEW, 77% of American voters are online every day. And in addition, 43% are online several times a day, while 26% reported being online nearly constantly. Building up organic followers through high-traffic sites like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram allows you to create an audience you can communicate with, for free, on your schedule.

The difference between spam and viral content comes down to a simple difference: do you care about it?

One powerful way to help make sure your audience cares is to make sure you are using the powerful tools online that help you target voters based on their interests.

Does a spam email make you want to buy a product? Are you just thrilled to get a pre-recorded robocall from someone you don’t know? What about an unsolicited text?

You get the point. If unsolicited and irrelevant content annoys you, it is going to annoy voters when you do it to them.

In the beginning stages, focus on the quality, not quantity, of your online supporters. Don’t worry—we will get to how you can spend money effectively on ads. But first, one more tip on how to make sure voters come to you rather than block you.

By now it seems a bit old-fashioned, but the most important thing you can do to build a strong online campaign is to build a basic political campaign website that is optimized for mobile, and update it regularly with relevant information.

If a voter called to volunteer on your campaign, you would call them back right away and thank them and plug them into the campaign—right?

When a supporter makes a donation, you immediately thank them if you want to ever get another donation from that supporter—and keep a friend. When someone leaves you a voicemail, you work hard to return that call the very same day. When you talk to voters, you try to remember the names of spouses, where the kids go to school and what they mentioned when you knocked on their door last.