Campaign Team Size
0-5 people
The important thing is not you’re not in this alone. Having even a small background team is essential. Core members with expertise in areas such as fundraising, marketing and social media is what we are seeing a lot this year. Make sure your team contains people with this experience.
6- 15 people
The standard medium size campaign usually stays between 6 - 15 so know that you are in a stable place. Anything bigger than 6 people and we recommend you have point people. People who have designated roles who can delegate to the other team members, this will only further improve the efficiency of your campaign team.
15+ people
Team support isn’t an issue for you which is great news. Utilising these numbers is where your priority should be. Getting all your team members set up on some kind of online system or even a Whatsapp group should be a given. Make communication as streamlined as possible as this will help when organising events, canvassing or even teams for phone banking.
Voter Database
What’s a database?
Your database is crucial for voter outreach. You will need a list of the people you plan to interact with, you can either add these manually as you canvass or upload a voter file. You can find voter file resources here
Electoral register from local gov
Once you have your file, you’ll want to check that it’s optimally structured - the information contained within each column should be homogenous, and remember to pre-populate any data you might need to before import. If you need assistance with cleaning your Voter File, the team at Ecanvasser can help you!
I’ve a detailed voter file from a party source and I’ve regularly made updates to it
We can take for granted that you know your way around an Excel sheet! It’s really important that you can benefit from having so much data. Consider how you intend to use your data when deciding how to record it. For example, if you have a custom field on whether or not people want lawn signs, a Yes/No option is much more efficient than allowing your canvassers to input Text, which is less efficient for segmenting. Text, Number, Multiple Choice, or Checklist allow a great versatility in gathering data points. If you want to learn more about voter file best practice, the team at Ecanvasser can help you!
Polling Day Count Down
1-3 months
Ok you have no time to lose. How many doors can you knock in a few weeks? Maybe a combination of email outreach and leaflet drops is the best option here?
6 months
The standard run up to an election is usually 6 months so you have time. It’s best to spend to spend the the first 4 weeks implementing your strategic with your team and then plotting out any major events you may want to hit on your campaign trail, remember to schedule weekends for door knocking too as this is the best time to get large numbers out.
Nearly a year out - I just want to be super prepared
We usually see this in people who are onboarding new softwares and technologies. People who are also first time candidates like to allow themselves more time incase lots of changes need to be implemented. Remember it takes to time to get to know an electorate for the first time.
Social Media as your Campaign Tool
It’s not something I’ll be utilising in my campaign
We see this a lot, people don’t want to invest in social media because they may not already be active on the platforM. We would always encourage to at least have one social media platform active. Facebook is a good place to start, especially to share photos, campaign news and event invitations.
Just the basics, Twitter and Facebook maybe
Good, the important thing now is to make sure these accounts are active. Daily or weekly updates are a must, because visibility online is as important these days as visibility offline. Remember it’s all conducive to building your brand.
Yes, social media is crucial, we’re visible on nearly all of them
Excellent, if you want to talk social media strategy, why not set up a call with us and connect with us on social media.
Your Canvassing Plan
No
Research shows that canvassing helps earn votes so I don’t know why you would pass up that opportunity. Now’s the time to plan, start with the basics and recruit some team members to go door knocking. Check out this post we did on the importance of canvassing.
Canvassing will be done but not a priority if I’m honest
Interesting that canvassing isn’t a priority given the benefits that come with door knocking, we would urge you to reconsider. Think of the relationship s you can build, the issues you can collect and not to mention the PR opportunities. Check out this video to see the importance of video..
Yes canvassing is how I’ll win votes, I’ve seen all your videos telling me so!
Yes canvassing is a priority! Ok, that’s great news. How you segment your voters is the foundation of your campaign. It will affect how your very first canvass will target voters; how you will follow up with these voters; and how you will manage the data you gather on theses canvasses. Consider a multi-pronged, strategic approach to segmenting: At the outset, decide both who you are going to target, how you are going to target them, and how you intend to lock down these votes.
Tracking Issues & Follow Up
Is that really necessary for a campaign?
Yes, showing voters that you have created a system which allows you to better manage their problems shows them that you are in it for the long haul and not just around election time. Voters would appreciate this more.
Yes, I’ve done this previously with traditional methods?
Ok, so you know the importance of tracking voter issues. Breaking it down to make the most of it:
Create a framework to help you be effective in your issue management.
Manage it which means, know your own limitations.
Communication, aka database outreach. Be able to easily connect with your public, be that over the phone,face-to-face, through social media. Log everything accordingly, and don’t lose anything of value.
Show commitment by following up after the first interaction, this shows the voter that you didn’t make an empty promise, show them you are working at it.
100% - technology makes this so much easier nowadays?
Are you using Ecanvasser, we make issue tracking a number one priority because long term engagement with voters is what we strive for.