Communications 24/7

You will be discussing your candidacy in various ways every day, whether it’s seeing someone in the market, knocking on a door, or speaking at a forum, and you should bring these conversations back to your central theme, or top-line message. In this episode we will teach you basic communications and cover all the ways a political candidate can talk with voters: TV, radio, online advertising, social media, paid phone calls, text messaging, direct mail, billboards, yard signs, podcasts, emerging and niche platforms, and traditional press.

Learn more about Organizing to Win: The Art & Science of Running for Office - including free downloadable guides - by visiting OrganizingtoWin.com.

Transcript

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You're listening to the audio version of Jimmy Tickey's book Organizing to Win: The Art and Science of Running for Office. This book will teach you how to enter the political arena, manage a campaign, and run for office.

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Communications 24-7. We have heard federal campaign slogans like Change We Can Believe In and Make America Great Again. Local and state messaging may not be as pithy, but a theme that allows your campaign to bring every issue to one unifying principle will keep you on message. This is called your top line message. This kind of communication allows you to tell voters what you stand for in a clear and concise way. You will be discussing your candidacy in various ways every day, whether it's seeing someone in the market, knocking on a door, or speaking at a forum. And you should bring these conversations back to your central theme or top line message. While newspapers are decreasing in circulation, the news cycle is still 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and with the help of social media, everyone is plugged in. We are in an environment where there is never a slow news day. It's a constant release of content, so your message needs to be strong enough to get picked up by the online algorithm. Even with the loss of local news sources, you will be a part of that public exchange of information and will need to provide voters with content to advance your candidacy and earn votes. You may even have become an expert in a certain area, and people may think of you when your issue comes up. There's no guarantee that someone will look at all of your mailers. Read your entire editorial, listen to your whole ad, so every nugget of your communications should convey something about you. Over time, a voter will understand your campaign through these layered, repeated messages. When you talk about your candidacy, speak in clean, clear words. Use positive action words like started, achieved, or created to show what you have done. Be bold in messaging by talking about what you are fighting for, but know the difference between bold and menacing, confidence and arrogance. Voters want someone who will fight for them, not someone who thinks that highly of themselves. Confidence will come from a deep understanding of your why, the reason why you wanted to run in the first place. You should talk in a way to reach most voters where they are, so use accessible language. Forget the lofty policy jargon that everyday people do not use. This is a communication to a voter, a busy young person, a parent with kids, a working person juggling jobs, so message with that in mind. There are so many ways to communicate to voters, including TV, radio, online advertising, social media, paid phone calls, text messaging, direct mail, billboards, yard signs, podcasts, emerging a niche platforms, and traditional press, whether it's paid or earned. Depending on the scale of your campaign, you may not need to employ all of these options. Some of the most effective communication tactics include TV ads, cable and streaming, direct mail, and especially online advertising, social media and digital. Take note of what others have used for similar campaigns in your district and use a variety of methods. For example, local candidates may not leverage TV commercials but will use direct mail and online advertising. Through layered communications, people will start noticing your candidacy, and they may like your next social media post or read your mailer that has been sitting on their kitchen table. Stump speech. The term stump speech originated from early American customs in which a political candidate would bring a tree stump around with them, get on top of it, and speak to the public. You may not have a stump with you, but no matter the situation, you must be able to shift into your stump speech. Without it, some may think you didn't even mention you were running for office, and they may have wanted to hear from you. What do voters need and what do they want? Connect that with what you have achieved already and with that authentic reason you are running. In two minutes, bridge that with why you are the best candidate to deliver for them as you introduce yourself. For example, a quick pitch could be As someone born and raised in this community, I have seen a lot of representation over the years, and I believe we need a strong voice to represent the people in our community and ensure we are taking pride in our downtown. That's why I started the downtown small business crawl to get more people to shop local and visit our downtown. I want to revitalize our downtown with mixed-use developments and more affordable housing options. I will be that strong voice for our neighborhoods, and I am running for counsel to represent a community I care deeply about. With more time, the candidate could expand by giving more examples. I want to take care of the streets in our district and ensure we are paving and maintaining roads and aging infrastructure. I have heard from residents how we must improve quality of life with more sidewalks in our downtown neighborhoods, and by fixing our recreational sites. We can do this by holding taxes as our business district continues to grow. When I was running for local office, a friend of mine invited me to a small business networking group. I thought it was a nice gesture and I was happy to go and meet people in town. Walking in at 7 30 AM, I shook people's hands and introduced myself and was whisked to the front of the room to address the small business owners. I did not plan to speak and certainly had not one sip of coffee yet, but I knew a few things right away. These were business owners. I was running for planning and zoning, which is the economic driver in town. I spoke of my candidacy and connected it to a vibrant business community with balanced development. I learned that morning, when running for office, always be ready to speak. Visual assets. We are in a visual age, so be sure to take high-quality photos and vertical videos for your campaign. Think of people who represent diverse constituencies, like students, senior citizens, and business owners. These will be individuals who agree to be photographed, and these assets can be used at any point in the campaign. Set a day to have a photo shoot which will save your campaign time in the future when you are in need of photos. When taking such photos, bring several outfits so you are not wearing the same clothes in every photo for the campaign. Mailing and printed materials. Your campaign material should have the same color scheme and font with a uniform logo. As you lay out your communications plan, there are a few basic questions you will want to address. Who are you? What do you believe in? What is at stake in this election? Why should someone vote for you? The first thing you'll do is introduce yourself. Tell people who you are and what your story is before you announce policy positions. Include photos that complement your story, including ones showing you being involved in the community or photos portraying any notable endorsements. Then, share what you stand for in the weeks before the election. You can do this by laying out policy positions and program ideas. Depending on the scale of your campaign, this can be one mail piece or several showing the ways you'd make a positive difference in your district. Mailers should not have an overwhelming amount of content, but should have a balance of visuals, a written message, your slogan, contact information, the election date, and where they can vote. A compelling piece will get people talking and may even lead to press coverage. Ending with election day, you'll ask for a person's vote. Keep in mind that election day is no longer just one day. It can take place over a period of time given early voting. So stress the importance of having their voice heard during the voting period, not just on election day. Depending on the demographics of your district, consider other languages as well. Here's an example of what a good mail program contains. One, introduction of yourself to voters. Two, your priority issue, think of your why. Three, issue mailer number one, may be targeted to a segment of your list. Four, issue mailer number two, may be targeted to a segment of your list. Five, issue mailer number three, may be targeted to a segment of your list. Six reintroduction of yourself, recapping your priority issue. Seven, contrast against your opponent or a response to your opponent's attack on you. Eight, reminder to vote with where and when. Earned media. Earned media or free press is when you earn a traditional press article without payment, often by issuing a press release, which will have news about your campaign. For example, when you announce your candidacy, you'll get coverage simply by entering the race. When you hold a press event, you can send an advisory in advance to alert local publications to the event. A press advisory is similar to a release, but it gives the press what they need to know to cover before the event takes place. Doing good work and keeping the media informed will lead to greater awareness about your campaign. Think of ways to involve the local press, like inviting a member of the press to come door knocking with you in a neighborhood your campaign has already covered, so you know there are friendly voters there. This will allow you to bond with the reporter and provide the visual of a candidate meeting voters where they are. Paid media. Paid media is advertising for which you will need a budget. This could include robocalls, those automated calls to people with a recording, printed ads, radio or TV, cable and streaming. For TV, you will need to learn what media market you are in, as some are very costly. For targeted digital media, you'd be wise to get help from a consultant who can help navigate creating good ads and placing them in front of your voters in the right location. For print or radio ads, you can work with local media providers that reach your electorate. Social media. Social media is omnipresent in our lives. We spend more time looking at our social media platforms than we do talking with some friends. That constant consumption of social media means candidates must figure out how to engage digitally. Your social media should convey your personality, presence in the community, and policies you will enact. Essentially, the messaging of your campaign should be supported and amplified by your online presence. At the onset of your campaign, it's important to determine what social media platforms you will engage with. Don't feel like you need to be on every platform, but rather choose a few and do them well with regular posting. This way, your content is tailored to those platforms and your campaign can manage a few accounts. If you try to be on every platform, it will be cumbersome for your campaign and you will not give each one the attention it deserves to grow an audience. Consistency in posting to platforms will keep you in front of your voters digitally and give the appearance that you are everywhere. Don't make it a goal to be a viral sensation, but rather to have an authentic online presence. If your content finds a home online, it will naturally go viral, which is the point. You could ask for engagement, like saying, comment below to let me know what you think. When someone comments positively or with a question, your account should reply, which will show there is an interaction helping with the much discussed algorithm on social media. Noting your page is one that gets good engagement. Undoubtedly, you will be faced with trolls, those courageous individuals who have a lot to say behind the anonymity of a keyboard. My rule of thumb for campaigns is to not feed the trolls. In other words, do not engage with people who are simply trying to get you to spend time away from what's productive. Sometimes people will have a genuine concern and you should address that. Other times, you'll identify repeated comments from the same person who's trying to eat up your time by posting misinformation or mean-spirited comments. If you respond to one, you'll encourage bad behavior because they will expect you to comment every time. In addition to the communications calendar we've discussed, I suggest your team develop a special social media calendar, working backward from election day, noting all the major holidays, mindful of demographics and religions in your district. Then, layer in state and local days of significance. This can include local fairs, sporting events, and notable days in your district. By having a calendar, you can schedule posts in advance, ensuring you are engaging your followers regularly. Digital advertising. Organic or free social media posts will only take you so far, so you'll want to consider paid digital advertising. This can take a few forms, including boosting social media posts to targeted audiences, paid advertising messages across social media, and advertising on websites. For example, if you have a post and you want more people to see it, you can take steps to authenticate your Meta account for political use and boost that post on related platforms. So, if you have a post on Facebook and Instagram, both under the Meta platform, about your new senior tax abatement program, you can direct that post towards those over the age of 65 in your district, further expanding viewership. Working with a good digital consultant, you can serve messages to segments of your voter universe directly on websites popular in your district, like YouTube. Just as you would send a mailer to certain people in your universe, think of this as serving messages to a portion of your universe online, like to women in the district or voters under the age of 40. The technology is intuitive, so you can target not only your zip codes, but you can further target your own voter list. Yes, your voter list to get to your win number. So the right people are seeing your ad. One rule of thumb in campaign advertising is that people need to see your message over and over again. So don't invest in digital marketing in the final days of a campaign. Instead, set a budget for paid advertising for several weeks leading up to election day. People need to see you multiple times, often called impressions, in order to be effective. And with a budget for digital marketing, you'll be present again and again as people are scrolling. Video and Emerging Platforms. With people busier than ever in a fragmented media environment, short video clips are the currency of the day. Realizing this, find ways to film and post short clips one minute or less so people can hear directly from you. The video could be you talking into the camera about an issue or with a community leader about a topic you each care about. Online users are quick to scroll, so get to the point within the first 10 seconds, with good lighting, so it's pleasant to watch. Having a good video editor on your team is key to an effective social media presence. Posting regular vertical video clips will create the feeling that people aren't just watching your videos, but they are spending time with you. They are a part of a conversation. In this fractured media space, it's more important than ever to reach voters in niche ways, operating within a communications ecosystem. These sorts of non-traditional media can amount to a large number of voters when you layer your appearances thoughtfully over time. Podcasts, influencer platforms, TikTok, and emerging social media sites, local online shows, and niche online newspapers are all ways to reach voters where you can be a guest on one's show. Ask young people where they get their news and seek out those influencers in your district and ask to collaborate. Suddenly, people will see that you are popping up everywhere. This will help differentiate you as a candidate, and we want you to do things in your own way. Getting the most out of content. When it comes to social media, leverage your existing schedule and work smarter. Say you visit a local farm and district and the owners are supportive of your candidacy. You can post about that business on social media. You'll take photos there and can post an unused picture when the farm opens up its fall apple picking, for example. When the holiday season approaches, post another unused picture encouraging people to shop local when they purchase holiday treats, perhaps for their pies. You can take a video that your team can splice together to create a series of visits to small businesses in town. Beyond social media, you can talk about the visit while campaigning, connecting it to an issue in town, like local tourism. Since the owners were supportive, you could use a photo with them on a mailer. This one visit has now multiplied in content, offering you several ways to gain mileage out of it. Questionnaires, endorsements, and surrogates. Your campaign will be asked to complete an endorsement questionnaire by interest groups and organizations. Sometimes your answers will be kept private, and other times the questionnaire might be made public and can be used against you given the leanings of the group. Campaigns are increasingly weighing the pros and cons of such questionnaires, and if the endorsement is not worth the time and effort, it will be listed that you did not respond. Mindful of your own politics, the district, and the questions involved, your campaign should decide what groups you'd want to earn the endorsement of and complete those surveys. Throughout the campaign, your team should release endorsements to the public. Think of these in two categories, people and organizations. When people endorse you, think of their reach in the community. Those who held the office before you and well-liked leaders may endorse you through a video with a short statement, or you can film a brief video being endorsed. For groups whose questionnaires you completed, work that endorsement into your communications plan. For example, if you are endorsed by the local firefighters, you could announce that endorsement during an event with first responders in your district. This way, you have a captured audience who cares about the topic at hand, and it serves as a good visual backdrop for press purposes. Be mindful of the timing of your endorsements to avoid oversaturating your social media pages all at once. You may want to frontload key elected officials and community leaders so that once announced, they can campaign with you. You may then space out respected groups later in the campaign or release several at one time in a single press release. Keep in mind how many overall endorsements you release. Mindful that voters will decide the selection, not endorsers. Further, your campaign can benefit from trusted surrogates going out on the candidate's behalf with a message. The campaign should think about pairing an event with the best surrogate, someone who has a connection to that very group. Having a credible validator supporting your candidacy can make all the difference in earning respect within a community. High stakes interviews. Chances are you will have a local paper that will cover your race. Those local reporters will, from time to time, communicate questions, whether in writing or through a more engaged tactic of talking to the candidate live. When speaking to the press, know that despite what the pre-arranged topic is, the journalist can ask anything, so be ready to discuss any topic, whether you are given advanced notice or not. If a topic comes out of nowhere, do your best to answer. Should they ask for information you don't know, inquire when their deadline is and the campaign can respond or give background information. Background information is data that may be public, but the news source would not cite it back to the campaign itself, so you are basically providing helpful intelligence that assists in making your point to the press. In those longer conversations, know what topics and themes you and your campaign want to address, and always come back to that overarching message. Assuming that this is not live TV, you and a reasonable reporter can sort it out and get them information after the fact. Remember, never answer a hypothetical question, which can only bring you down an uncomfortable path of many what-ifs. Some conversations with the reporter can be set as off the record, meaning the reporter will use the information for their knowledge, but not directly report it. Though they will remember you said it, so is it really off the record? Brand consistency. Your campaign is becoming a brand, so consistency in your message and style is important. Be sure your campaign uses a high-quality logo and there is synergy of messaging across your platforms. Just as you shop at franchise stores and expect the same branding at each location, you want to ensure voters are experiencing your brand in familiar ways, whether they are chatting with you on their doorstep, receiving a piece of mail from you, or coming across an online ad of yours. So often we are focused on who we are talking to. But let's spend a moment on who we are missing. When I manage campaigns, I like to pause at times and have an exercise where we brought together the field and communications teams to find what groups we had not communicated with enough among our universe. The field side can explain the voter outreach with data, which may show gaps. For example, we've spent very little time in a certain ward or district, or we hadn't connected enough with 18 to 35 year olds. Tie those voter gaps with communications opportunities in an effort to be more intentional about outreach. The campaigns of yesterday were all printed press, hoping to land above the fold of a newspaper on your front steps. The world of communications has changed drastically and will continue to. In the spirit of differentiating yourself, pursue the traditional methods and consider all the new ways to reach voters. Talk with your team and younger voters supporting you to learn about digital platforms showing high usage in your district, which can give you an advantage over your opponent.com.

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