Fire Your Campaign Manager
Filed under: Campaign Technology, Red Alert Dossier
If you’re a candidate or campaign team ready to hire a campaign manager…or you’ve already hired one please take note:
If the first thing your Campaign Manager tells you to do is to get on Facebook and Twitter…show him/her the door.
Sounds odd coming from we tech centric uber geeks who live inside the Matrix eh? Not really. Here’s why. Although Twitter and Facebook are obviously KEY tools in the overall campaign arsenal…they are merely part of a multivariate marketing equation that will drive you to victory.
When a campaign manager is obssessed with Twitter and Facebook first without having an overall content / web strategy…that means there are serious gaps in their approach. Okay, maybe you don’t have to fire him/her…but absolutely call us and we’ll do a 2 day immersion camp that will blow their minds. It will be a good save for you campaign manager and the best thing for your candidate.
Iowa Caucus Recap – Technology Dilemma
Filed under: Campaign Technology, Red Alert Dossier, local politics
I attended the Iowa Caucus yesterday and learned quite a bit about the process. See an off year caucus is designed to elect leadership and fill county volunteer positions on committees, to elect delegates, etc. I am now a delegate for my precinct and feel that much more connected to our great process. But here’s something I ran up against in my precinct huddle.
The group was vigorously discussing how we need to get sons and daughters engaged. We have so many voting age college students/high school seniors that are seemingly ignored by most candidates/officials. Ask Chris Hagenow how important even 80 little votes can be to winning a seat? What if those 80…or 200 or 1000 were between 18-24? There were great ideas but it wasn’t until the very end where someone mentioned “That twitter that all the young people are on”. I don’t expect Citizen USA to know demographic data on these tools…but she was headed in the right direction.
I sat back trying to assess where this group was regarding technology and I chimed in, “Does anyone here NOT have email and is anyone unwilling to provide it as a method of organization?” (silence). So we had our 100% possible compliance technology. So I raced home, built a WordPress site, set up an email list on Aweber’s email marketing platform and bought an easy to remember URL. After all that, I had a moment of reflection, dropped what I was doing…and created a Facebook Group. The thought was “Keep it simple stupid”.
I’m sure we’ll end up doing what campaigns and candidates should do..and that’s to be where people ARE and communicate in the ways THEY want. Is that more work? YES. Does it require more infrastructure? YES. But can one tie them all together to provide a “web” or network of information that “disperses to all of the content outposts” for a campaign automatically? You bet.
We’ll see how this plays out and I will report on a regular basis….but now that I’m in the trenches of my actual neighborhood, I’m going to learn a lot more about what works, what doesn’t, and what we can pass onto other precincts.
More to come.
Tracking A Candidate’s Online Reputation
Filed under: Campaign Technology, Red Alert Dossier
- Image via CrunchBase
We have 2 courses in our Interactive Learning Environment on listening. Listening is the first step for some candidates and campaigns but not nearly enough of them. Listening goes beyond Google Alerts on “Your Name”. As a candidate (or campaign manager or consultant, etc.) you need to cast a very wide web. There are tools and systems out there that will scour and filter for you beyond your wildest dreams. One such system is FiltrBox (acquired by JiveSoftware just announced today). We use this and provide customized “daily briefings” to clients’ in boxes (if they like email). For some clients we actively listen, filter, and act (blog, tweet, comment, etc.).
The bottom line is that talking during the campaign cycle is a given. Listen is a much rarer commodity. Listen…and win.
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Twitter Debate Roars On
- Image via Wikipedia
I get asked no less than 5x per week by politicos, “I mean come on who really has time for Twitter?” Usually that’s followed by, “I just have daughter do it for me.” Yes you do…yes…you do.
Twitter is an engagement and awareness tool. Sure you’ll have a percentage of tweets that are informative (links and event announcements) but this is usually where it stops for most.
Take it a step further. Ask questions. Provide answers. Find supporters and build a hyper local twitter following so you have a concentrated and high-power audience that markets your message for you.
Diminished Importance of Mainstream Media
Filed under: Campaign Technology, Red Alert Dossier
- Image via Wikipedia
(By John Burnley, Contributing Author to ORS)
Last time I discussed the importance of constituent engagement and how technological tools were beginning to transform the political campaign process. However, I also issued some warnings about utilizing these tools without purpose, strategy or gauging effectiveness. Whether social/new media tools like Facebook or other software, voice or video offerings etc. are implemented, mimicking other campaigns in their use of technology may not produce the desired results. Nevertheless, online campaign initiatives are beginning to take hold. There are more examples surfacing of candidates realizing the importance and relevance of embracing newer approaches to reach constituents, whether to pass information, solicit donations or promote volunteerism.
We are also seeing a shift in the way information is being delivered to the public. I recently ran across another example of social media being used to distribute political technology related content. According to the Facebook page “California governor’s race travels the information superhighway”, the Golden State’s 2010 gubernatorial race may be the most technologically based contest yet to be seen by the state. Candidates have been using Twitter, YouTube videos, Google search advertisements and other social media and online tools. One candidate even made his campaign official via Twitter.
The page also questions if alternate methods of information delivery will diminish the importance of traditional media such as radio and television. YouTube videos, as well as other online or social content delivery mechanisms can be used to respond more quickly to events than traditional media as well as go on the offensive against an opponent. While I’m not intrigued by a new wave of negative candidate bashing YouTube videos, this does allow a candidate the opportunity to respond quickly to comments, inaccurate claims etc. without the possibility of the content being edited or diluted down by traditional media or fighting to have the information delivered to the public at all.
There is no hint about any of the underlying strategies for tool utilization or determining effectiveness, but it does illustrate how campaigns are becoming more innovative in their attempts to reach constituents.
As with most political venues, funding for information and technology for the various candidates is across the board ranging from $17,000 – $900,000. In an economy where many grassroots candidates may struggle for financing, these numbers illustrate the importance that some high profile campaigns are placing on newer methods for constituent engagement. Seriously, Doug, raise your rates for ORS!
Twitter, an Incredible Search Engine
Filed under: News, Red Alert Dossier, Social Media
Well, we’ve done it again. Today we just launched another fantastic course on “Listening on Twitter.” For those of you that had tuned in last night to the Red Alert Hour you may have heard me say, “Twitter is one of the most powers search engines on the web.” In a world of Google, Yahoo and Bing you would think not much can compete. Well, if you search is news related or business/political anything Twitter may be the first place you want to stop.
Twitter is generating more content than any website I have ever seen. Okay. So maybe it’s not the original outlet of the content so it’s not really “generating” it but it is one of the most popular venues online to share this content. Seriously. Twitter had the following Google did it would blow Google out of the water in terms of searchability.
Why do I say that? Twitter has created the perfect search and share environment. It’s like a peer to peer content sharing site. Imagine LimeWire or Napster (back when it was free, years ago) but instead of music, pics and videos you are sharing links and information, legally 
. Furthermore, Twitter has provided a fantastic search mechanism, hashtags. I’m not going to explain hashtags because I’ve done that enough. But everything and anything is findable on Twitter.
All of that said (I noticed I say that a lot) here’s why this matters. Imagine the benefits of leveraging this tool to gather campaign intelligence. To understand what your listeners feel about issues. By leveraging Twitter you can move your campaign to the level it needs to be at to win your next election. Fortunately, there are applications that have been provided by third party developers that make listening on Twitter incredibly simple.
Find out more by subscribing to ORS, remember, it’s only $97 a quarter….for now.
Listening on Twitter
Filed under: Classes, Social Media
This course has been designed as a way to help you listen on Twitter. Twitter has thousands of applications that do a variety of things but when it comes down to it, being able to listen clearly through the clutter is by far your most powerful tool. Listening to Twitter can be a difficult task so we’ll take you through some tools that you can use to optimize your “listen-ability” while saving as much time as possible. There are also certain programs out there you can use to aggregate the functionality of some of these tools.
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It’s Finally HERE! Hyper-Local Targeting With TWITTER!
Filed under: News, Red Alert Dossier
That’s right gang. I actually have two announcements to make today. First, this is officially the 200th blog post at OperationRedState.com and I think that’s pretty freaking sweet considering we started blogging just under a year ago (104 of which were content posted from yours truly). As lame as that might seem, I’m pretty stoked about it.
More importantly though….We’ve noticed an incredible need out there and it’s not just in politics. Messages can be refined over and over again, tweets can be sent time after time and you can even update your Facebook status daily. That doesn’t mean the right people are receiving your message. You could be missing all the right people.
I’m not a huge TV watcher and when I do I like to watch the commercials. I watch the commercials because I like to count how many ads reached me that I really couldn’t care about. So either I’m an anomaly in the stations’s viewership or some of these advertisers don’t have a clue. I’m sure to some degree it’s a combination of the two. What if you could send your message to a hyper-targeted population? What if you just want to reach out to those in the public sector? Or those just in Waukee, IA? What if you wanted to send multiple custom messags to different fragments of your constituency so they hear and read the things that are most important to them?
Now you can! ORS will be posting an awesome course in the next three weeks on Hyper-local targeting with Twitter. By local I don’t ever restrict the definition to a geographic area. When I say local I mean people that are local to a category, like, say, accountants. Local meaning you are able to reach out at a very granular level. No more of these 5,000 mile tweets where you’re basically throwing stuff at the wall hoping it sticks.
This course will be especially helpful to those of you running in smaller races from city council to school board to State Senator. I’ve felt that our courses, though fully applicable to small races, have somewhat neglected these candidates because we were missing this piece. The ability to localize your eCampaign. So keep your eyes out this month because we’ll be sending an email out to the lot of you when the course is officially posted.
The Authentic Tweet
Filed under: Red Alert Dossier, Social Media
I’ve had this discussion recently with a few different people and I feel the need to blog about it. As I’ve alluded to in recent posts there are many marketers out there that feel an authentic tweet is not yours if it’s not you. It was Spring, I believe, of this year when Twitter was all a rage because everyone found out that Guy Kawasaki, an online genius, used multiple ghost-tweeters. There were people I saw that unfollowed him for that vary reason. Seriously. Despite the fact that he generates some of the best content out there, not to mention a phenomenal site, AllTop.com, they unfollow him because it’s not always HIM who’s tweeting. Frankly, I find this obnoxious and unreasonable.
There are business people out there who have Twitter accounts they use for marketing purposes. So, among the million things a business owner has to do during the day (hire, fire, taxes, scheduling, managing, servicing, repairing, maintenance, paperwork, and you know the list would go on and on and on and on) some people have the audacity to expect them to be the one and true voice on Twitter. I’m sorry. That’s not rational and you are not rational for thinking this way.
So the argument typically continues like this. “Well, politicians represent themselves on Twitter so they should be the one interacting, posting, etc on Twitter.” Is that so? Since when did a politician represent themselves? HAHAHAHA. I know. I see that too. Let me rephrase that. Since when did a strong, conservative candidate only represents themselves? A politician represents an organization…a movement…a constituency. @VoteForMe is not a person but a representation of something much, much bigger. It is not vital that you spend 20 hours a week blogging, tweeting, updating on Facebook and sending text blasts. If you do I’m afraid you’re going to lose because that’s 20 hours you don’t get to spend IRL (in real life) in front of the people you seek to represent. Hiring a ghost tweeter is NOT a bad thing. I don’t care what people say. They obviously have never run a campaign or they do this type of thing for a living which affords them the opportunity to spend 20 hours in Twitter.
Does that mean you don’t have to ever tweet? No. You still need to communicate. You still need to interact. Just use common sense. IT’S NOT THAT HARD! Stop over thinking it. Go out and find someone (like us 
) that knows what they’re doing and get it DONE!
Drive Campaign Sales!
Filed under: Red Alert Dossier, Social Media
Today I joined Doug for the Red Alert Hour and we discussed a few things I really want to extrapolate on. It really is amazing how few people get it. Not just in politics but even in business. People assume that because it’s called social media it is meant to be only ’social.’ They think that these online communication venues are only meant for interaction. Why is it that communication within the world of social media is constrained to be defined strictly as ‘friendly interaction?’ Are television ads not communication? Are radio ads not communication? Heck, are newspaper ads not communication?
I bring this up for a very good reason. You see….political AND many social media consultants aren’t saying that selling (fund-raising) through social media is pointless. Rather, they are saying DON’T DO IT! They say it’s against all that social media stands for. They say it’s not authentic. This REALLY erks me. Let me share why.
Social media STILL follows all the basic marketing principles. How does my tweeting back and forth with you about the weather going to make you give me your hard earned cash? IT DOESN’T! It does make you think I’m a nice guy to chat with, but that’s it. I’m not just saying this – I’ve experienced this with past clients. You need a call to action. You need to tell them why you are online. If you are on Facebook and Twitter just to chat…more power to you. But don’t complain when your sales aren’t going up or you haven’t hit the level of funds you need for your campaign.
Social media IS selling. It’s selling yourself. It’s selling products. It’s selling services. It’s selling oppportunities. It’s selling and selling and selling and selling. Get the point? The argument they always give me is that you need to brand. Yeah. So what? You tell me what good branding is if you aren’t going to sell what you have to offer. Wait. You don’t have to because I already know it’s useless.
So get ready, here’s what it takes. Branding and selling need to be simultaneous acts through social media. You have mere seconds to position yourself, peak interest, coerce a click and motivate your viewer with a call to action. That’s right. In a matter of seconds. It’s shorter than TV and radio. This is done through content generation. Provide your viewers with valuable content and ALWAYS remind them to donate funds to your campaign. There are some strategies we use at OperationRedState and of course you’ll have to sign up to find out what . But it really does come down to the fact that if you are ONLY conversing with your following don’t expect anything to happen.
People don’t vote for friends. They vote for leaders. They vote for people they know will stand up for what their constituents believe in. They vote for people that communicate with them and ask for their help, both monetary and through actions.
You aren’t online to be their friend and frankly, I don’t want to be your friend. If you are then that’s all you’ll ever be – the friend that keeps running for office but seldom wins. You are online to lead. Show me your a leader. I dare you!
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Social Media
