This looks amazing:
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
Sunday, November 8, 2009
Winning in 2010: Online Outreach
From e.politics:
The variety of outreach outlets available to online communicators can be overwhelming, so let’s start with a few basic principles to help sort out the options.
Go Where The Audience Is...
Have a Clear Connection Back...
Content Supports Outreach...
Integration is Key...
Targeted and Scattershot Outreach Can Coexist Happily...
The Tools:
Online Social Networks...
Blogs...
Twitter...
Online Video...
Online Advertising...
Other Online Communities...
Getting People to Act on Your Behalf...
For instance, campaigns can ask supporters to:
Recruit new list members
Spread the word about a fundraising push
Promote a YouTube clip or blog post
Post content to MySpace or Facebook, turning their profile into a “virtual yard sign”
Link to the campaign from Twitter or their personal blogs
Attend real-world events (rallies, house parties) and invite their friends and family
Winning Online in 2010: Tools, Time and Resources
From e.politics:
Online politics may look new, but most of what a campaign does over the internet is really just a reincarnation of some classic political act...
But compared with traditional political tools, the internet truly excels at maintaining relationships with many people at once...
Despite the difference in size between a national and a local race, most campaigns will still end up with the same three basic online elements:
A central hub, usually a website.
A way to stay in touch with supporters, usually through an email-based Constituent Relations Management System but potentially including Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and text messaging.
Online outreach, to influence the wider public discussion and recruit new supporters and donors...
When it comes to the conversion process, content is key
Completing the connection, every scattered piece of the campaign’s online content should refer back to the main website — people shouldn’t be able to encounter the campaign online without also finding a way to get involved. Online content is more than just a persuader, since it attracts visitors via Google and the sites such as YouTube and Facebook on which it’s hosted. Of course, even the best content is useless if it’s hard to find or consume, so a campaign website needs to have a straightforward navigation scheme, with information clearly labeled and broken into digestible chunks...
Why email? Despite the hype about Twitter and Facebook, it’s still the most effective tool to raise money, motivate volunteers and keep supporters engaged — for example, roughly two-thirds of the $500 million that Barack Obama raised online came directly from someone clicking on a “donate now” button in an email message. Email reaches many people who still haven’t joined the social web, and it’s also turned out in practice to have much higher response rates than other channels, often by a factor of ten or more. Email remains the “killer app” of online politics, despite constant predictions of its demise.
Not that we’re talking about spam! Campaigns should use mass email only to communicate with people who have “opted-in” to their list by signing up online or at an in-person event. Except for targeted outreach messages to bloggers, journalists and activists, email messages should serve as a relationship-management tool, not as a recruiting tool (though every respectable CRM can include “tell-a-friend” links to help messages spread from person to person).
As for staying in touch with supporters via cell phone text messaging, it’s been the “next big thing” in online politics for several years now — and it still is. Most CRMs can collect cell numbers, but so far relatively few campaigns in this country have been able to put them to use, in part because of constraints built into the U.S. telecom system. Text messaging will no doubt be a good fit for certain campaigns in 2010, but it’s likely to remain more of a niche application for now...
Nowadays, many state- and local-level campaigns still piece together an online presence, perhaps combining inexpensive tools from a company like ElectionMall with a website built by their media consultants or a local firm. But candidates can also choose from an array of tailored professional offerings, particularly on the Democratic side, where vendors now offer integrated website/CRM/fundraising packages for just about every campaign budget, often accompanied by consulting on effective online strategy and tactics. Several hundred state-level Democratic campaigns used DLCCWeb (integrated with fundraising site ActBlue) in the 2008 cycle, for example, while others moved up the cost/hand-holding scale to systems from NGP Software or Blue State Digital...
Rather than thinking of “online” as its own separate world, smaller campaigns should follow Obama’s example and integrate the internet more broadly into their operations. For instance, traditional media relations and blogger relations require most of the same skills and employ many of the same tactics, so even if resources aren’t available for a standalone blog team, the press folks could include bloggers and Twitterers in their outreach portfolio. On other fronts, campaign’s media consultant can produce online video clips, though they’ll have to adapt to a very different world than that of campaign commercials, and field organizers can embrace Facebook and other social networks.
In some ways, more important than the resources devoted to online outreach is when they’re employed. List-building and much of the rest of online outreach are incremental and reward an early start. For instance, even before a campaign has a CRM is in place, they should collect names and email addresses whenever possible, since the candidate can always bring a laptop and a staffer or volunteer to real-world events.
Unless it’s flying under the radar for some reason, a campaign should generally establish a presence in prominent online spaces as soon as possible, beginning the process of feeding the website and CRM via a Facebook profile, YouTube channel, MySpace page and perhaps a Twitter feed. They should also reach out to prominent online voices early, building relationships with relevant bloggers and Twitterers just as they would with local officeholders, party activists and journalists...
Even buying Google Ads can be relatively straightforword! Since an active campaign should be creating a constant stream of content in the form of announcements, press releases, videos, photos, position papers, etc., the main time commitment (beyond direct outreach to online influentials) is usually keeping the various channels fed, egos massaged and incoming messages answered.
A rule of thumb? If you’re a small campaign with a single staffer, try to spend 4-8 hours planning and executing your online-specific strategy per week, at least at the beginning, remembering that those early hours can be far more valuable than time spent a week out from the election. One critical consideration: keeping up with a campaign’s internet presence needs to be someone’s defined responsibility, since otherwise it tends to fall through the inevitable cracks. Obviously, as we move up the scale campaigns should devote more resources to online outreach, particularly to the process of turning passive followers into active donors and volunteers. Regardless of their size, campaigns will constantly be buffeted by outside events, but they should take care to keep the steady process of building a supporter base on track even as day-to-day events scream for attention...
How Candidates Can Use the Internet to Win in 2010
From e.politics:
Here’s why state- and local-level campaigns should pay attention to the potential of internet-based politics:
1. The Internet is (Just About) Everywhere...
2. Online Fundraising Works...
3. The Tools and Techniques are Available to (Almost) All...
4. Targeted Online Outreach + Down-Ballot Candidates = a Perfect Match...
5. You May Not Be Online, But Your Opponents Probably Are...
If You Want to Change Congress, Fund Challengers’ Staff Early
From e.politics:
Republicans are getting their first views of their current legislators in action: if you want to change the direction of your party in Congress, or of Congress as a whole, fund challengers’ staff early. And by “early,” I’m talking about a year in advance of the relevant primary or general election.
I’m not sure who said it at NN (possibly Matt Stoller), but the idea stuck with me because it goes to a core problem insurgents face when they’re taking on an incumbent or an establishment candidate: lack of resources when they really matter. As elections get close, blogs and activist groups can shift significant amounts of money to a “netroots” candidate on the Left (or a “rightroots” candidate on the Right?), but by then it’s often too late to make much of a difference. Since so much of creating a campaign organization is incremental — built up one volunteer, supporter or donor at a time — the really valuable time to have staff is many months BEFORE the actual vote. In effect, one hour of an organizers’s time a year before the election yields much more benefit than that same hour of work a week before the election.
Early funding also has a snowball effect — since people usually don’t want to throw their money away, they’ll generally only support a candidate who seems to have a chance to win. Before insurgent candidates can get much outside attention, they have to hit a threshold of support that indicates that they’re a serious contender. They have to have enough of SOMETHING — money, polling numbers or on-the-ground organization — to convince outsiders to get involved. And without resources and expertise available early, many candidates who might actually have a shot if given a chance never quite hit the mark. A handful of paid staff, or even just ONE paid staffer, can create the relationships and the organization that a campaign needs to prove viability, while also getting the structure in place to actually take real advantage of any money that floods in at the last minute.
10 YouTube tips to spice up your video
From CollActive:
Here are ten tips we’ve gathered here at Collactive, to help you promote your next YouTube video:
Create a Relevant, Informative Video...
Keep the Video Short...
Select a Catchy Title and Thumbnail...
Embed Wisely...
Promote “Fresh” Videos...
Choose Your Video Category Wisely..
Target the “Most Viewed” Lists...
Ask Your Community to View Your Video...
Ask Your Community to Promote Your Video...
Ask Your Community to Promote Your Video on Social Media Sites...
Joe Rospars and A Billion Minutes on YouTube: Content was Key (and Overlooked) Part of Obama’s Online Juggernaut
From e.politics:
At a panel discussion at GWU’s School of New Media and Public Affairs on Monday, Rospars described in particular the vital role of online video content, whose power the campaign recognized from the beginning — very early in the race, Obama’s team already included a videographer and screenwriter/producer squad to shoot footage both for internal/documentary purposes and (more importantly) for use in public as a persuasive tool.
Rospars described Obama’s use of video as breaking open a new channel of content, one with an almost unlimited volume and one that was key for volunteer motivation. Direct messages from the candidate, strategy briefings, supporter profiles and other pieces of “insider” information all helped to create a long-term relationship with campaign workers and volunteers, providing a context for otherwise-boring organizing tasks and serving as a direct inspiration for people to donate money and time.
...
Because the campaign was staffed with people intent on coordination and had the good leadership to ensure it, the campaign’s online content, organizing and fundraising were all woven together and reinforced each other. This linkage was evident in the use of the online tools themselves, since the Obama blog (which Rospars described as the “glue that held our relationship with supporters together”) and email list pushed video video views in classic integrated campaign fashion.
Twitter is NOT a Strategy
From e.politics:
The Twitter fixation currently sweeping segments of the news media and the political world (particularly on the Republican side) reminds me of those innocent days of the early web. Not to put Twitter down, because it definitely has valuable uses, but it’s just a tool — and if you don’t know WHY you’re using it, you’re probably not going to get much out of it.
For you or your organization, is Twitter a journalistic live-coverage tool? A platform for (very short) punditry? A reputation-builder? A way to connect with others in your field? A personal journal, broadcast to the world? An RSS supplement, a way to send out links to your own articles? A collaborative community-builder? A reporting system for distributed events (”someone just stole the ballot box at my polling place!”)? All of these and more are perfectly valid ways to use it, but each requires a different approach if it’s to succeed.
THE REVOLUTION WILL NOT BE TELEVISED – A REVIEW
From Local Politechs:
Knowing that readers would looking for the recipe of success online, Trippi’s provides the following points
Be first – The first comer has a heard start on building a community.
Keep it moving / Don’t be static – The Internet is a fluid medium and your presence should should be organic and flowing.
Use an authentic voice – The Internet is not the place to be safe
Tell the truth – The Internet has an inherent transparency.
Build a community – Get people involved!
Cede Control - Your supporters are smarter than you. Given them a chance.
Believe again
Debunking Six Social Media Myths
From BusinessWeek:
But before you take the plunge, bear in mind the many myths that surround social media.
1. Social media is cheap, if not free...
2. Anyone can do it...
3. You can make a big splash in a short time...
4. You can do it all in-house...
5. If you do something great, people will find it...
6. You can't measure social media marketing results...
WHAT DO YOU MEAN MY CAMPAIGN NEEDS TO BE INTEGRATED?
From Local Politechs:
Our reader brings up a good question. Integration and the level of integration means different things to different campaign managers. One thing for sure is that social media and other internet efforts on a campaign cannot stand alone in any campaign or organization. As such, I think each campaign should seek to four levels of integration - Team integration , Data integration, Communication/Message integration and Off/online integration. Let’s a take a closer look at each.
How Blogger Relations Differs from Traditional Media Relations
From e.politics:
Bloggers are usually different — no one goes to blog school! And consistent professional rules have yet to gel. Bloggers generally aren’t listed in media guides, so they may be tough to track down. And, even when you find the right sites, not all of them will even have an email address listed, so contacting the authors may be a lost cause entirely. When you do manage to get a blogger on the phone or engaged in an email or IM conversation, he or she may interpret the rules of the conversation very differently than a traditional reporter. “Off the record” may mean nothing, for instance, and that carefully crafted quote you devised for your boss’s statement will likely fall on deaf ears. Rules of thumb: bloggers generally laugh at press releases, and anything you write in an email might end up published.
So how do you break through? The hassle is that each blogger and each particular niche provides a unique challenge. In some fields, particularly the technology and celebrity gossip worlds, bloggers DEPEND on tips — without companies pitching or insiders dishing, TechCrunch and PerezHilton wouldn’t have nearly as much to write about. In the political and policy worlds, though, many bloggers seem to resist the notion that their ideas are influenced by outsiders, and pitching them stories can be a dicey proposition.
First, you’ll need to spend some time on each site you’re trying to pitch — get to know their stories and their audiences to see how you might shape your info to match. Next, package your story well, with links to supporting material and additional resources that might pique the author’s interest. On group blogs, carefully identify which authors are your best bet and approach them directly — a writer on the rise might be hungry for a fresh angle on an issue. If you can, buy ‘em a beer (or coffee or lunch) — bullshitting with a blogger is no different than cultivating a relationship with a reporter. Once they’re ready to write, give them something they can actually use: a juicy paragraph, nice graphics or embeddable video. One other point: remember that the blogger probably isn’t your target, but his or her audience IS. Blogads may do more good than a pitch.
Ning’s Gina Bianchini on Using Custom Online Social Networks for Politics and Advocacy
From e.politics:
Unlike general social networking sites, which create a common river of profiles in which everyone swims (think our individual networks of social connections as groups of rafters floating on the current), Ning has built a platform on which anyone can build a defined online community of people interacting around any issue or interest. A MyBarackObama.com in every garage! Of course, as with blogs and so much else online, many of these erstwhile communities will fade for every one that thrives.
Why set up a custom social network? For political or advocacy communicators, Gina sees it as a chance to start and facilitate a conversation among supporters or advocates (and for commercial marketers, among customers). In classic social media fashion, a successful online community tends to strengthen your relationship with your audience. To be mercenary-minded, it can lead more donations and more advocacy actions down the road, but it can also create unexpected opportunities for your grassroots allies to work together on their own. Go far enough, and it might just upend the usual top-driven listen-to-us attitude that nonprofits still frequently exhibit toward their activists (and companies toward their customers).
The Internet’s Role in Political Campaigns
From the Bivings Report:
The results clearly showed that while Web use by political candidates increased dramatically since 2002, politicians are still failing to take advantage of all the Internet has to offer. Ninety six percent of this year’s Senate candidates have active websites, while only 55 percent of candidates had websites in 2002. While most candidates use a set of core Web tools, the majority of candidates are refraining from using newer and more sophisticated Web strategies, such as blogs and podcasts, on their campaign websites. Only 23 percent of Senate candidates are blogging, just 15 percent offer Spanish alternatives to their websites, and an even smaller number of candidates, 5 percent, maintain podcasts. In contrast, between 90 percent and 93 percent of candidates offered biographies, contact information, and online donations on their websites. It is obvious from these results that despite a general increase in the use of the Internet for political campaigns, candidates are still hesitant to pour finite financial resources into new campaign strategies.
Fact Sheet on Youth Vote and Text Messaging
From the New Voters Project:
Across the board, text message reminders increased the likelihood of an individual voting by 4.2 percentage points.
Of the different messages tested, a short, to-the-point reminder was most effective, with a boost of nearly 5 percentage points.
In a follow up survey, 59% of recipients reported that the reminder was helpful, versus only 23% who found it bothersome.
Hispanics had especially positive feelings about the reminders.
At just $1.56 per additional vote generated, text messaging was extremely cost effective.
Learning about Audience-Building from a New Blogger
From e.politics:
Pick your niche...
Be a new or distinctive voice
Choose your adversaries well...
Being inflammatory can be fun, and useful...
Being connected at the start doesn’t hurt, either...
Why Think Tanks and Nonprofits Should Be Thinking Like (New Media) Newsrooms
From e.politics:
It’s easier than ever to produce deep, data-driven projects, and your organization can often do it better than even the biggest media outlets.
“Easier” is relative, of course. But here’s why it’s time more of us started thinking creatively about what we can put online:
The Data is the Hardest Part...
The Work Won’t Go to Waste...
It No Longer Costs a Fortune...
It’s not just that we can do this sort of thing, or course. It’s that we should.
How to Build Traffic to a Blog: Ten Tips
From e.politics:
Have something to say...
Write often...
When possible, write about timely subjects...
Write on weekends...
Write clear headlines...
Use trackbacks...
Even if you’re usually aggregating outside content, try to do an occasional think piece...
Contact the people you link to...
Pitch individual articles to authors who might link to them...
Write articles for other websites...
10 (+1) Ways to Build Traffic to a Website
From e.politics:
Content is king!...
If content is king, for most sites, niche content is even more kingier...
Feed the beast regularly...
Be easy to find on search engines...
Don’t miss an opportunity to put your website address in front of a potential audience...
Stay in touch...
Let your readers help...
Participate in the online discussion...
Contact opinion leaders in your field directly...
Consider producing pieces for outside sites...
If you have the resources, paid search (Google) ads and carefully targeted blog ads can pay off...
Key Tools for Online Advocacy and Online Politics
From e.politics:
DNC Internet Director Josh McConaha made a statement that cuts through a lot of the hype surrounding online politics. Answering a question from the audience about how to choose among the vast array of online channels available, he listed three technologies that just about every campaign would benefit from using. It’s not surprising that these are also just about the most basic tools out there. Different campaigns will place more or less emphasis on any one of them based on their particular requirements, but these are the consistent winners:
Email. As in, an email list for relationship-building, fundraising and volunteer organization.
Website. Usually a campaign’s online focal point as well as a good list-building tool.
Outreach. Direct communication with whoever’s writing about you online, in blogs of course but also discussion groups or other online communities.
Josh noted that once these bases were covered, a campaign would have room to start experimenting. After these essentials, he mentioned social networking as a next logical step, with video an increasingly powerful tool as well.
Obama Campaign’s New Media Staff was NOT a Part of the Tech Team
From e.politics:
More often, online organizers and online advocacy staff are put in the technology box rather than allowed to be communicators — for instance, at my old environmental job, people often came to me with their computer problems, when I’m a writer/designer and in no way a real techie (trust me). And online communicators are often the last people consulted when messaging and outreach strategy are being planned, when they should be a part of the process from the beginning.
This also gets at a deeper issue in the online advocacy world — that political people often think of the internet as technology, when really it’s communications. Often, the problems political groups encounter in online outreach have nothing to do with hardware, software or websites, and everything to do with institutional systems and institutional structures. In other words, it’s not the tools, it’s the people and how they’re organized and directed to USE the tools.
The Obama campaign used the internet as well as they did not because they employed tools that were particularly new (database-driven field organizing, email fundraising, online video and social networking have all been around for years) but because they worked out human systems to put those tools to work effectively. A critical part? That the internet people were NOT put in an online technology box — they were integrated into the general structure of the entire campaign. Until candidates and advocacy groups realize that online communications is about communications and not really about technology, they’ll continue to miss the internet’s real potential for politics.
Obama Campaign Saw “Ridiculously” High ROI from Google Ads
From e.politics:
Another tip from the Obama campaign: take a solid look at search advertising. At two recent public discussions, members of the winning 2008 new media team have mentioned the effectiveness of Google ads in building the campaign’s list of supporters, volunteers and donors. Email team head Stephen Geer alluded to it in passing in a RootsCamp presentation, describing search advertising as having a “ridiculously” high Return On Investment as a list-builder. Joe Rospars talked significantly more at a second NOI-sponsored event last month, divulging that search and contextual ads (Google Ads) were the backbone of the campaign’s online advertising outreach, and that a relatively straightforward strategy had been steadily and consistently effective.
Here’s the real kicker: when compared with the cost of acquiring supporters via other channels, search advertising absolutely shone, with an ROI Rospars described as approaching 15:1. With contextual ads targeted primarily to sign up new supporters, the core of the campaign’s strategy was the obvious “Barack Obama” search, though they did use some issue- and news-cycle-targeted keywords. The new media team bought display advertising significantly less than they did search ads, and focused the display piece of the puzzle more on measurable goals such as list-building than on amorphous “influence-the-discussion” ad runs.
Ten Rules for Blogger Outreach
From e.politics:
1. Know Your Targets...
2. Target Your Pitches...
3. Participate When Possible, But Otherwise Monitor...
4. Buy ‘em a Beer...
5. Be Cool...
6. Value = Content + Credibility...
7. Twitter and Google are your Friends...
8. Link to Them...
9. Try and Try Again...
10.Reporters are Bloggers, Too...
Saturday, November 7, 2009
The Ten Commandments of MySpace Advocacy
From M+R Strategic Services:
Thou shall:
1. Decide if MySpace is the right network for your organization...
2. Prepare to lose control...
3. Know that your MySpace efforts may not pay-off right away...
4. Look at who’s already talking about your organization on MySpace, if anyone...
5. Make sure your site is ready before you tell anyone about it...
6. Post your edgiest, most viral content...
7. Figure out which of your supporters are on MySpace already, and ask them to be your first friends!...
8. Continue communicating with your MySpace friends...
9. Devote staff time to making your MySpace page a success...
10. Funnel users to your organizational website to build your email list...
Two-Thirds of Obama's Online Fundraising Was Via Email
From e.politics:
A quick correction to “Learning from Obama” — roughly two-thirds of Barack Obama’s online fundraising in 2007-2008 came in directly via an email solicitation, meaning that the money was donated by someone clicking on a link in an email. Let’s think about what that implies, which is that EVERYTHING else that the campaign did to raise money online basically just supplemented their email program.
...
And for political communicators looking at the landscape for 2010 and 2012, the lesson is clear — for all the explosion of online tools over the past decade, the combination of an email list and a fundraising website STILL blows every other channel out of the water as a dollar-raising tool, assuming at least that you’re running a competent email fundraising operation. You should go where your audience is, obviously, which may well put you out on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook and every other venue imaginable, but you’ll ignore the basic tools at your own peril.
How to Reach Unsuspecting Voters via Email — No Spam Involved
From e.politics:
Several companies will take a database of voter names and physical addresses (which candidates can get from the state parties) and do an “email append” to add email addresses for as many people on the list as possible. The emails come from consumer databases and they’re typically available for 15-20% of names on a given list.
The downside? No one on the list has expressly opted-in to receive communications from a campaign, so we’re basically talking about spam, although political communications officially don’t count as unsolicited commercial emails. But even if they’re legal, out-of-the-blue emails from a candidate or campaign are likely to yield a poor response, which is why most campaigns use email to build relationships with existing supporters rather than as an outreach tool.
Charles’s idea? Instead of sending out generic messages from the candidate, why not recruit and train volunteers to work with the people on the voter list who are in their neighborhoods? Just as campaigns send out “walk lists” of potential supporters for volunteers to visit based on the voter file, they could provide volunteers with an “email list” of neighbors for them to contact directly. Interesting approach, though of course it requires campaigns to be comfortable with volunteers communicating on their behalf. But, if they’re not comfortable with people acting for them online, they’re not going to be able to take much advantage of most of the new generation of internet political tools.
Targeted Facebook Ads Aren’t Just for Big Political Campaigns
From e.politics:
Today’s POLC panel about Online Politics at the State Level aimed to be practical and specific, which is why we packed it with people who’ve actually run for office. One takeaway: targeting Facebook users via advertising is easier than I expected, even for local candidates. Republican Patrick Mara, who defeated a 16-year incumbent in a DC city council primary last year (he lost in the general), got excellent results from aiming ads at Facebook users based on information they specified in their profiles.
For instance, Patrick was in favor of allowing gay marriage, so he pushed information about his stance out to DC Facebook users who’d listed their sexual orientation as gay. If Facebookers had kids, he targeted them with ads about the school system, and if they were Republicans, he hit them with information about taxes, school vouchers and similar conservative favorites. Very clever! And apparently quite cheap for the results — Patrick found Facebook advertising to be a great way to recruit volunteers. Future local campaigns, take notice.
Media Fragmentation and Niche Marketing
From e.politics:
The rise of cable, Tivo and the internet fragments media audiences and helps limit the effectiveness of traditional broadcast advertising (no surprise), so marketers need to go where the audiences are. Microtargeting is vital.
Since 2001, the audience for cable tv networks is greater at a given moment than the audience for the traditional broadcast networks, but advertisers are still spending significantly more money on CBS, ABC and NBC than on cable. So, cable is both better-targeted (since its audiences break neatly into niches) AND cheaper...
Search advertising (Google adwords, etc.) can be effective because it catches those people particularly interested in a topic at the moment when they’re MOST interested — when they’re trying to find out more about it...
Google ads can reach beyond the Google site itself, since the company provides contextual ads (ads tied to a page’s content) on thousands of other sites, including major media outlets. By extension, this applies to other contextual ad networks besides Google’s.
Though most attention to the role of blogs in politics is focusing on the big national sites, campaigns should be paying attention to local blogs and working with them to shape perceptions and help mobilize supporters.
With the spread of more-capable cell phones and other mobile devices that can handle rich media such as the ‘net and video, people are going to be receiving more and more news and information on the go. Forward-thinking campaigns should be getting cell numbers from activists NOW, so that they’ll be ready for the next generation of tools in a couple of years.
Friday, November 6, 2009
Working with Local Bloggers
From e.politics:
Some things that both electoral and issue advocacy campaigns can think about:
The national blogosphere is pretty well matured — there isn’t a whole lot of room left for new political blogs to build an audience. Locally and regionally, though, far fewer people are writing about issues, and new blogs have a much better chance of being able to find a niche.
Local blogs are often looking for stories with a local/regional angle and may be more receptive to story pitches than national bloggers, who are frequently overwhelmed by email from campaigns and interest groups.
Local political blogs often have a “water cooler” function — they’re a place where political activists and operatives gather to discuss issues and campaigns. Conversations on their sites can thus have a disproportionate influence on local influentials and opinion leaders. This effect is probably more important before a primary election than in a general, since uncommitted voters probably aren’t reading blogs aimed at political junkies, but blogs can still influence the level of excitement local activists feel as elections loom and hence affect the effort they’ll put into campaigns.
Local blogs may be a much better route into the media than national ones, since local media outlets are often crying out for news. Particularly since so many local newsrooms have suffered cutbacks, issues promoted in local blogs can make the jump into smaller newspapers and television newscasts, especially if they’re well packaged or involve breaking/investigative stories. And once stories are in a mainstream media outlet, they can be picked up by wire services and spread widely.
How to Build a Better Political Campaign Website
From the Bivings Report:
(1) Create a graphic design that says something about the candidate...
(2) Give visitors stuff to do besides just give you money...
(3) Recognize your best volunteers...
(4) Make fundraising pitches specific and tie them to events in the news...
(5) Cut down on the number of emails, particularly the ones begging for money...
(6) Don't blog unless you are going to embrace the spirit of blogging...
(7) Publish as much content as possible via RSS feeds...
(8) If you go negative, try to be clever about it...
(9) Provide users with a behind the scenes look at your campaign....
(10) Create a community around your site...
Dropping a Googlebomb on Republican Candidates in the Midterm Elections
From e.politics:
What’s a googlebomb? A concerted effort to influence the search ranking of a given web page on a certain topic — in other words, an attempt to pop a page to the top of search engine results.
In this case, bloggers encouraged site owners across the web to link from chosen Republican candidates’ names on their own pages to specified unflattering articles on the web. The goal: to push those articles up the list of results for searches on the targeted candidates (see the section on search engine optimization for more on how search engines work).
The results? Dramatic — 36 of the 52 articles jumped to the first page of search results and in many cases they rose into the top five links. The ethics? Debatable. I take a perverse glee in political dirty tricks, the more cleverer the better, so I should love this stuff. But it does make me slightly nervous — depending on how well it works, googlebombing could become an accepted and normal tactic for influencing the information that’s presented about friends and enemies alike, which goes against the whole idea behind Google and other search engines (that useful and relevant information will naturally rise to the top).
Of course, a successful googlebomb could inherently self-destruct, since the search engine folks do protect their results zealously and could simply intervene to knock a bombed page down the list — by its very nature, the coordination behind a googlebomb is likely to end up being very public and trackable. Let’s keep an eye on this one.
Getting the Most Out of Google Ads and Other Pay-Per-Click Advertising Campaigns
From e.politics:
Tips for Pay-Per-Click Advertising Campaigns
Here are a few tips I recommend when you are running PPC campaigns:
Make sure to do keyword research before determining what keywords to use in your ads...
Check your keywords against multiple search engines...
Research the seasonality of keywords...
Do a competitive analysis of the keywords used by organizations you may be competing with for search terms...
Make sure to create specific landing pages for various campaigns...
Make sure to optimize your landing pages...
Set up a clear testing strategy...
How Voters are Using Search Engines in the 2008 Election Cycle
From e.politics:
The Internet has outpaced newspapers as the second most influential channel for election news coverage, after television.
Voters are most concerned about the issues (i.e., they’re more often searching for information about issues rather than directly for information about a given candidate)
Economy and health care issues have increased in search prominence, while global warming is not as hot
...
As for the particular issues, here are the top ten, along with the percentage of searchers hitting each:
Health care - 49%
Economy - 49%
War in Iraq - 48%
Gas prices - 44%
Immigration - 37%
Social security - 37%
Jobs - 35%
Education - 35%
War on terror - 30%
Environment - 30%
These results are obviously useful for the campaigns themselves, but they can also help issue advocacy groups that are trying to piggyback off of the high level of political interest this year. They’re also an interesting angle for looking into voters’ minds — ripe for comparison with polls (i.e., how does aggregate online behavior match up to people’s self-reported interests?)
7 tricks to Viral Web Marketing
From Baekdal
1: Make people feel something...
2: Do something unexpected...
3: Do not try to make advertisements (that sucks)...
4: Make sequels...
5: Allow Sharing, downloading and embedding...
6: Connect with comments...
7: Never restrict access!...
The Internet’s Role in Political Campaigns
From the Bivings Report:
We recently completed a study that assesses the utilization of the Internet as a tool for 2006 political campaigns. The study, a follow-up of the 2002 version, examined how 2006 senatorial candidates used the Web to publicize information about their campaign platforms, personal backgrounds, and volunteer opportunities. We looked at a number of Web campaign tools and made comparisons based on party affiliations, importance of particular races, and whether candidates were incumbents or challengers.
The results clearly showed that while Web use by political candidates increased dramatically since 2002, politicians are still failing to take advantage of all the Internet has to offer. Ninety six percent of this year’s Senate candidates have active websites, while only 55 percent of candidates had websites in 2002. While most candidates use a set of core Web tools, the majority of candidates are refraining from using newer and more sophisticated Web strategies, such as blogs and podcasts, on their campaign websites. Only 23 percent of Senate candidates are blogging, just 15 percent offer Spanish alternatives to their websites, and an even smaller number of candidates, 5 percent, maintain podcasts. In contrast, between 90 percent and 93 percent of candidates offered biographies, contact information, and online donations on their websites. It is obvious from these results that despite a general increase in the use of the Internet for political campaigns, candidates are still hesitant to pour finite financial resources into new campaign strategies.
Adventures of a Dead Elephant on MySpace
From Frogloop:
Getting a viral campaign to “take hold” is like lighting a fire in the rain. Once blazing, a fire will withstand rain. The problem is how to get it lit in the first place. A blow-torch would be very helpful for this: greater expertise in design and strategy, direct advertising, and a mass email marketing campaign, for starters. Unfortunately, all we could afford was a pack of matches. We budgeted two weeks of keyword buys from Google (resulting in about 700 visits at 10 cents each), and one week of Blog Ads to low-distribution blogs (which have just started running.) We have done one fairly large mailing (3300 recipients) to a list provided by afriend, which generated surprisingly high click-through rate (about 30%). Given that performance, it strikes me that our campaign has suffered a huge opportunity cost in not being able to send large proactive e-mailings to a pre-existing social network.
Web 2.0 News Aggregators Strategy
We also promoted DeadElephant.ORG on several of the largest “people-powered” news networks, including Digg, Care2 News Network, Shoutwire, News.Netscape.com, and Reddit (all show the actual campaign except for Shoutwire and Reddit, which are gone). In fact, the campaign was initially launched on the Care2 News Network. This was a big early success: It was the “hottest” story for about a week, garnering 143 “note-its” and 83 posted comments. That translated to something on the order of a thousand visits to our site, which really got us going. Over on Digg, if your story gets “dugg,” you can receive tens of thousands of visits as a result. However, we could not get any traction on Digg. Digg seems noticeably more right-leaning, more tech-oriented and a more insular culture to penetrate. If we had had more time to build relationships with high-credibility Digg participants and groups, then we might have done better there. The campaign has had meager “take” on Shoutwire, News.Netscape.com, and Reddit. Our story received “votes” and “shouts,” but no significant traffic, probably because traffic on those sites is low to begin with.
Lessons Learned
1.) A MySpace page is not an advertisement - it is the avatar for a person - you.
2.) Create a great web-badge and post it into the comment area of all the friends you gather.
3.) Is your content viral in nature?
4.) Do you have enough edge to cut through the noise?
5.) Target specific segments of the community.
6.) The design quality of your page may not be important.
7.) A MySpace page is not a site – it’s a single page.
In sum, this is a fun way to campaign, but it also requires a lot of work. If you build it, they may come, but more likely you’ll still have to rely on good old fashioned promotion techniques (if there is such a thing as good old fashioned on the web) to get the campaign going, and have content available that people will gladly pass along to their friends.
Viral Video in Politics: Case Studies on Creating Compelling Video
From New Politics Institute:
While a great deal has been written about the explosion of viral video on the web, very little has been written about how to create great content that gets virally distributed. The tools for creating the content are potentially available to all progressives, and include iMovie packaged standard on all Macs, software for creating your own flash animation, downloadable effects packages, etc. Yet knowing how to harness these tools still calls for an understanding of storytelling and how to create narrative in a visual medium. Fluency in the technology does not always translate into mastery of the medium.
Even less has been written about how progressive organizations and campaigns can create and use video content to expand the reach of their political messages. There are screens everywhere – in our homes, in our hands, even at the car wash. And figuring out how to capture the audience on all of these should be a big part of future political communications strategies. No matter what size the screen, no matter how vast the outreach capabilities through the internet, the content is still the engine that drives viral hits. And just because everyone has access to the tools doesn’t mean that there isn’t some technique, and often professional execution behind the stuff that really works.
Good viral video begins with a good story. There are many points of entry when trying to gain people’s attention so that you have the opportunity to engage them, keep an ongoing relationship, and move them to action. You need to find a compelling way to hook them and “brand” the effort – much the same way that large corporations think about how to engage consumers and create a lasting relationship with them.
Trying to get something to “go viral” rests on one’s ability to be both authentic to the mission while being inventive enough to capture people’s imaginations in such a way that they feel compelled to share the video with others – immediately – and that they are also suitably impressed with the humor or the pathos of the piece that they want to dig deeper and learn about the organization or campaign that has created it.
This is why viral content is a visceral experience, not an intellectual one. People often mistake viral video for a purely informational tool, when it is more accurate to describe it as a more complex cultural tool, with informational aspects. This doesn’t mean that there isn’t room for important ideas to be part of the story; it means that you must be tactical about wanting to capture people, in order to show them an introduction to a longer and more meaningful dialogue.
“Online With a Shoestring Budget”
From e.politics, which form of new media?
Pro
Still the most effective tool for staying in touch with supporters
Con
List exhaustion; declining effectiveness over the coming years?
Blogs
Pro
Good way to raise the profile of your issues; helps engage other bloggers
Con
Time-consuming; content must be compelling
Blogger Relations
Pro
Helps you spread the word and shape the online discussion; raises your profile
Con
VERY time-consuming
Video
Pro
Visceral medium; video-sharing sites can spread your message
Con
Good video is hard — your content must be compelling
Social Networking
Pro
Way to reach new supporters; can be a communications channel in its own right
Con
Low response rate; possibility of platform change (witness Friendster)
Social Media
Pro
Can yield more and better content than you could generate on your own; helps bond supporters to your campaign
Con
Requires heavy promotion; requires filtering
Wikis
Pro
Good internal campaign communications tool, particularly when married to an email list
Con
Can be hard to get people using it
Cell Phones
Pro
Allows you to reach supporters where they are; quick response
Con
Provider limitations; message length
Learn from this City Council Candidate
From e.politics:
And so on — the message goes on to explain what your donations would be used for, from door hangers to yard signs, and also includes a link to sign up to volunteer. Check out the social networking icons at the bottom (hmmm, one of the images seems to be broken), which feature prominently on the campaign’s website as well. Other noteworthy aspects of the site: a supporter list, clear email signup form on the front page (if possible, better to have it on every page), a list of upcoming events, and even a brief tour of Zimon yard signs in their natural habitat.
The verdict: nice job! An excellent site that serves as a solid online outreach hub, but that still has a built-by-your-neighbor look to it despite its advanced features, something entirely appropriate for a local candidate. Plus in this case, it’s supported by a solid email message with a compelling hook in the subject line (wait, how did Jill win already??), a clear ask and a well-stated value proposition. A little on the long side, though! Future emails might be shorter and more focused on a specific ask or piece of information, but that’s a minor quibble. All in all, good work and an excellent example for campaigns many times the size of hers.
Online Politics 101: The Tools and Tactics of Online Political Advocacy
Another great resource available for new media people from e.politics is Online Politics 101, a free download.
What Does “Viral” Mean?
From e.politics
But I’m realizing that when the word “viral” gets tossed around casually, it often turns out to mean something related but significantly different. For instance, when Attack of the Show features “viral” videos, what they’re really saying is that these are pieces that are popular on YouTube and which may or may not have benefited from much viral spread at all. In this case, “viral” means “widely seen.”
That’s why if a client says, “we want to create a viral video,” my first question will usually be, “what do you mean by viral?” If it turns out that their goal is to create compelling content that people in their targeted audience will WANT to send to their friends and family, then we’re off in the right direction. But if they really mean, “we want to create a video that will become immensely popular and spread like wildfire and everyone will see it,” we’ve got some ’splaining to do.
Because nobody can really predict whether or not a given piece of video or writing will take off like crazy, and there are a lot of people trying to make it happen. It’s a question of timing, content and opportunity that’s inherently chaotic, and hundreds or thousands of viral attempts fail for every one that gets seen by enough people to hit the bigtime — say, to get promoted to the top of YouTube or picked up on tv. It’s so remote a possibility that it may not even be worth aiming for, other than for fun.
But, good content CAN spread widely to targeted audiences through viral channels, regardless of whether or not it breaks out to a larger/mass audience. For political communicators, viral spread can be a natural ally, since it tends to work through each person’s particular channels of interest — for instance, I send political links to some friends, music links to others, Philadelphia Eagles links to a different (and currently quite happy) set. If you can produce words, images or video that catch the interest of the particular group of people you’re trying to reach enough, they’ll WANT to pass it far and wide — and once the fire is lit, who knows where it’ll spread?
Wednesday, November 4, 2009
House GOP launches social media crusade against healthcare package
From The Hill:
House Majority Leader John Boehner this morning introduced a new tool to help in the Republican push back against House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's health care package.
House GOP Members are using Amplify.com, an interactive blog-like platform, to break down the bill section by section, explaining each piece in understandable language and getting feedback from the public. Visitors can go healthcaretruth.amplify.com, leave their own comments and share sections via Twitter, Facebook and other social media tools.
Several Republican lawmakers, including Boehner took to Twitter to share the new site.
"As our members read the bill and uncover harmful provisions, Amplify allows us to clip specific portions and explain what they mean in plain English," wrote Nick Schaper, Boehner's new media director, in an email. "It's our hope that through this effort, we can help Americans undersatnd just what 1,990 pages of bureaucracy really means to them and their families."
Bob McDonnell’s Impressive Online Campaign for Virginia Governor
From e.politics:
If Creigh Deeds manages to pull off a victory in today’s race for Virginia governor, it won’t be because Republican Bob McDonnell was slack online. In fact, McDonnell’s internet campaign has been impressively comprehensive, meaning that state and local candidates can look to it as a model for applying the lessons of 2008. Let’s look at a few of the critical things he’s done right so far:
1. Website
2. Google Advertising
3. Ning Network
4. Text Messaging
5. Social Networking Outreach
More?
Thursday, October 15, 2009
FTC: Bloggers Must Disclose Payments for Reviews
From the New York Times:
FTC: Bloggers Must Disclose Payments for Reviews
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- The Federal Trade Commission will require bloggers to clearly disclose any freebies or payments they get from companies for reviewing their products.
It is the first time since 1980 that the commission has revised its guidelines on endorsements and testimonials, and the first time the rules have covered bloggers.
But the commission stopped short Monday of specifying how bloggers must disclose any conflicts of interest.
The FTC said its commissioners voted 4-0 to approve the final guidelines, which had been expected. Penalties include up to $11,000 in fines per violation.
The rules take effect Dec. 1.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Winning Online in 2010: Tools, Time and Resources
From techPresident:
The Basic Tools
Despite the difference in size between a national and a local race, most campaigns will still end up with the same three basic online elements:
A central hub, usually a website.
A way to stay in touch with supporters, usually through an email-based Constituent Relations Management System but potentially including Facebook, MySpace, Twitter and text messaging.
Online outreach, to influence the wider public discussion and recruit new supporters and donors.
Let's look at each piece in detail, with websites and CRMs covered below and online outreach a bit later.
Can Petition Tweets Change the World? An act.ly Quarterly Report
From techPresident:
What act.ly makes possible, says Jim, is for anyone to pounce on an opportunity, no matter how small, without the run-up and vetting and committee meetings that traditional advocacy groups might have to churn through before they act. Progressive groups aplenty spotted the fundraising potential of South Carolina Republican Joe Wilson's "You lie!" outburst, but Gilliam himself had an act.ly petition up and running almost immediately -- some 1,200 signatures in the first hour and a half, said Gilliam -- and once someone discovered that Wilson's opponent was on ActBlue, a short link redirect channeled outrage into campaign resources. "The stuff that works best," says Gilliam, "is anything really, really fast. It gives a lot of advantage to individuals over organizations, because organizations like to plan campaigns. They'll come up with the right messaging, coordinate with other groups. It takes time." Gilliam deemed the Wilson petition a success after the congressman indeed apologized.
And it helps if there is a specific, and colorful, hook -- and something tangible to do in response to it. Says Gilliam, "This is the MoveOn model. Take a message object that is going to get people riled up. But that can happen now in a matter of minutes on Twitter. If the first thing that people can tweet about isn't just the story, but the action that can be taken, that has a lot of potential." Beyond the Joe Wilson affair, though, act.ly's adoption and adaptation has proven most successful where the target of the petition is an organization, a company, or any other party that is worried about its reputation and is responsive to a wide swath of the population -- rather than a politician who is going to worry most about his or her particular constituents (and funders, naturally).
Bloggers and the Federal Shield Law
Something we have to pay attention to:
For citizen journalists, the federal shield law front was looking good for a while. Although the House of Representatives version of the bill, passed in April, only offered a shield to professional bloggers, the Senate version didn't differentiate between the pros and the amateurs. So there was hope that amateur journalists might actually, eventually, get its protection.
No longer though.
Sadly, the Senate Judiciary Committee has followed the path of the House and opted to specify that only a "salaried employee . . . or independent contractor" will be able to invoke the shield, reports the Wall Street Journal's Digits blog. The amendment, offered by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D) of New York, limits the definition of a journalist to one who:
(iii) obtains the information sought while working as a salaried employee of, or independent contractor for, an entity—
(I) that disseminates information by print, broadcast, cable, satellite, mechanical, photographic, electronic, or other means; and
(II) that—
(aa) publishes a newspaper, book, magazine, or other periodical;
(bb) operates a radio or television broadcast station, network, cable system, or satellite carrier, or a channel or programming service for any such station, network, system, or carrier;
(cc) operates a programming service; or
(dd) operates a news agency or wire service . . .
Saturday, September 26, 2009
How Candidates Can Use the Internet to Win in 2010 (Part One)
From e.politics:
1. The Internet is (Just About) Everywhere
2. Online Fundraising Works
3. The Tools and Techniques are Available to (Almost) All
4. Targeted Online Outreach + Down-Ballot Candidates = a Perfect Match
5. You May Not Be Online, But Your Opponents Probably Are
Begin at the Very Beginning
Report: Nine Scientifically Proven Ways to Get Retweeted on Twitter
From Fast Company:
1. Link Up (But Don't Use TinyURLs)
2. Beggars Can Be Choosers
3. Avoid Idle Chit-Chat
4. Don't Be Stupid
5. Semicolons = Satan
6. Break News
7. Use Proper Nouns Properly
8. Bottle Those Emotions
9. Tweet at 4 p.m. on Friday
New Media & Social Change: How Nonprofits Are Using Web-Based Technologies To Reach Their Goals
From the Hatcher Group:
Read the whole report here
A new Hatcher Group report reveals how nonprofits are using new media technologies to advance social change. Based on interviews and a 70-question online survey of 30 nonprofits working on state-level advocacy issues, “New Media & Social Change: How Nonprofits are Using Web-based Technologies to Reach Their Goals” shows what new media tools are being used and how, what’s working — and what’s not. The report offers advice and resources to help nonprofits use these increasingly important technologies to successfully promote their agendas. It’s must reading for organizations looking to make a difference, and their funders.
...
With the traditional media in flux, nonprofit groups are increasingly turning to alternative means to reach the public. At the same time, self-publishing and social media platforms on the Internet are experiencing explosive growth rates and new prominence.
To understand the relationship between these trends, The Hatcher Group set out to examine how a group of nonprofits working on state-level advocacy issues are using new media technologies to promote their agendas. Our goal in producing this report is to show how some nonprofits are using those technologies to advance social change, and to provide resources and advice to aid organizations in such efforts.
We focused on 30 organizations that are members of the State Fiscal Analysis Initiative, a group of independent, nonprofits with a shared commitment to responsible budget and tax policies. Their work is coordinated by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.
In May 2009, we asked each of these groups to complete a 70-question survey online, gauging their interest and experiences with a broad variety of new media tools and technologies. We then followed up with many of the organizations through in-depth telephone interviews.
We found that all of the organizations surveyed currently use new media technologies in some capacity, although 44 percent devote less than two hours to the task each week. Nearly all intend to increase the emphasis they place on new media over the next year — with half planning to increase their use significantly and another 40 percent planning a slight increase.
Nearly all also reach out to bloggers on a regular basis, and the few who currently do not plan to in the future. Similarly, 60 percent of the groups are now on Facebook, and an additional 30 percent plan to establish a presence.
Many of the organizations we spoke with found success using blogging and social networking to increase their role in policy debates, get their message in front of key audiences and connect with supporters.
Some other technologies were less popular. Despite all of the attention focused on Twitter recently, less than a quarter of the organizations have a presence on the service, and more than half have no intention of establishing one. And while more than a third plan to start submitting content to social news websites, none had previously done so.
In short, we found that the use of new media technologies to advance social change is very much a work in progress. Organizations have a high interest in using new media tools but are still unsure about which work best for them, how much time they want to invest in this effort and how best to use the evolving technology.
But this much is certain: The importance new media plays in helping communicate the message of nonprofits will only increase in coming years and organizations that intend to thrive in that environment should make a concerted effort now to stay ahead of the curve.
Read the whole report here
Friday, September 25, 2009
Social Networking Use Triples from Only a Year Ago
From ReadWriteWeb:
Obsessed with Facebook? You're not alone. The hours you spend logging on to update your status, post photos, and make comments on friends' walls is not simply a "phase" you're going through which will end sometime soon. It's a ongoing trend affecting everyone these days and it has serious implications for the online advertising industry.
According to new figures from Nielsen, the amount of time spent surfing social networking and blogging sites had tripled since last year, suggesting "a wholesale change in the way the Internet is used," says Jon Gibs, VP of media and agency insights at the company's online division.
As of August 2009, the time spent on social networking and blogging sites accounts for 17% of the total time spent online, a number up 6% from a year ago. This change reflects a growing desire for people to stay connected with each other, communicate and share, reports Nielsen.
HOW TO: Launch Your Own Indie Journalism Site
From Mashable:
Downsizing, layoffs, newspaper and magazine closings have put journalism on the most endangered careers list. But hundreds of smart journalists are realizing the opportunity and using their connections, reporting savvy and deep knowledge of their subjects to start sites covering their familiar beats.
These bootstrapping indie journalists are learning to run their own small business, including tending to many details they never had to worry about before—ad sales, marketing, promotion, tech and design to name a few.
Here, five former mainstream media reporters share their tips and best advice for creating a startup journalism site.
Why 140 Characters Works
From Brazen Careerist:
The reality is Twitter is the perfect tool to snippets of information. Think of Twitter as the headline machine.
Honestly, we don’t need more than 140 characters? Some of the most profound and memorable quotes in history and literature are less than 140 characters...
Five Steps To Making Your Blog Look More Professional
From Brazen Careerist:
Are you ready to take the next step with your blog? Do you want to set your blog up for monetizing it in the future? Then, there are a few things you need to change about it before you go forward. Here are my five steps to helping you make your blog look more professional.
1. Get away from Blogger and Wordpress.com....
2. Use the self-hosted Wordpress software....
3. Pay for a custom header or logo....
4. Create focused content...
5. Do research....
Welcome
This is a new blog about blogging. The point of this one will be to track all the developments in terms of the use of technology and the Internet and the Netroots in terms of politics. If you are interested in contributing, let me know at quinnelk@hotmail.com
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