Want to know how to win an election?

Never having had worked for a campaign or lived in a swing state, I read all the articles about massive GOTV effort like I'm reading a novel. I think that it's one of things you must experience to truly appreciate. That being said, the New York Times Magazine article that focused on the Republican effort in 2004 was one of the best insider views I have read on the topic. Ohio will one day become a classic case study in how to win (or lose) and election. The viral method that the Republican party picked up on and exploited to their advantage is a lesson every successful campaign manager must learn.

Rove and Mehlman gleaned a critical lesson from the 2002 Congressional and 2003 gubernatorial elections, Mehlman told me excitedly: the way to build a grass-roots movement is to get one volunteer to recruit several other volunteers, and so on, so that the organization is constantly growing, feeding off itself. The campaign provided various ways for people to volunteer, he said, and ''the big thing that brings them all together is viral activity.''

The way that they targeted potential voters by the cars they drove or the neighborhood they lived in was smart, in a creepy sort of way. I wonder what one of them would think of me, from a red state, daughter of small business owners, single college educated female in her early 20s, drives a Corolla, lives in an apt in downtown DC, Jewish...I am a mess of contradictions when it comes to party ID. I would love to ask a canvasser how often he is accurate in pinpointing exactly who a person is apt to vote for and how long it takes them to make the correct assumption.

The woman in the article who was 25 and had never voted because of excuses such as working two jobs, going to school, babysitting on the side would be a Democrat in my book, but the Bush team pegged her as Republican because she, "does all that work and works that hard," so she has to be.

To see grassroots as the next phase in campaigning, now that unions and parties are losing their hold on constituents seems natural with the technological advances of the past decade. But what it really comes down to these days is an ability to read people and tell them what they want to hear, and that's why Bush won in 2004. That's why canvassing in Ohio matters, and that's what campaigning has always been and remain to be about, no matter what else evolves.

It's a party problem...

I just finished reading the salon.com article on what a failure the Kerry campaign was. It's nothing I haven't heard expressed before, but it's always interesting to here it from someone on the inside who can so clearly see the problems. (Of course he never blamed himself)

In all of the reports released after the election, it was clear that while Kerry seemed to have all of this wonderful support from 527s, the fact that they could not communicate with the actual campaign meant the GOTV strategy was basically in disarray. Dems thought they had the advantage on this, and they took it for granted. The Kerry campaign itself obviously did not do it's best at GOTV. It's clear from our previous discussion on e-mail newsletters in the last week of the campaign, that while Bush's concerned GOTV, Kerry's were all about fundraising.

Verini is very right in his assertion that Dems weren't excited about Kerry, they were just amped up to beat Bush. No one stopped to think long enough to make sure Kerry had a well articulated platform. His campaign let Bush define Kerry early on to the extent that an above par debate performance was not anywhere near enough to erase earlier damage. And what I can't understand is why Kerry eventually used the same strategists that Gore and other previous Democrat losers used. I mean, Shrum? He hasn't impressed me yet. It's time for the Dems to learn their lesson once and for all and lose their misconceptions that they'll win because the Republicans are obviously evil.

I've never worked on a campaign, so I don't feel I can really put down those who do. I also don't think it's their fault. It's a party problem, and the party needs to find a solution-quickly.

don't forget it's a two-way street...

Having never traveled to a third world country, I had never really considered the cultural effects of peer to peer networks. As Siva Vaidhyanathan notes in The Anarchist in the Library, many natives of India, Africa, or Mexico cannot afford to buy a CD, DVD, and definitely not a computer. This is what is commonly known as the digital divide. However, because of black markets and straight out copyright infringement, they have access to pirated technology at a significantly lower price. I think that this opportunity is a great one. As Vaidhyanathan pointed out, without pirated software, business people in India would have trouble getting their jobs done. It's not like they would be buying most of this technology full price either. Many people in these countries are lucky to make $5 a day. How can we expect them to buy a $15 CD?

Whether you like it or not, we live in the age of globalization. A teenage girl in a small African village may have very likely heard of say, Justin Timberlake and want the opportunity to dance to his pop music. I don't think she will lose her cultural identity by being exposed to this music, and I bet JT would not be too upset at learning he lost a few bucks because this girl was listening to a pirated copy of his CD. He'd probably even want to give the girl a real copy.

Anyways, to get back on topic, the cultural divide that can result as a consequence of the digital divide is shrinking because the mass availability of peer-to-peer networking. In the same way, African artists, for example, are able to get their music to a wider audience. I think this is a great thing and what globalization should be about. We should have greater access to other cultures just as much as they learn to love McDonald's, Starbucks, and Justin Timberlake. Don't be so concerned with control that you overlook the great opportunity that peer-to-peer networking can provide.

on the mysteries of RSS...

Let me just start off by saying that I am someone who has never used a webfeed. I consider myself fairly technologically advanced, but whenever someone starts talking about RSS I tend to let my mind wander. However, I am very aware of how many e-mail newsletters are getting sent out and how many of them (thankfully) get caught in my spam filter. For those of you like me who don't completely understand how RSS work, this is a good primer. After reading it, I can now appreciate the concept of RSS feeds.

The concept of only receiving the news you want and getting it when you want is a good one. Perhaps as this communications medium becomes more commonplace, it can largely replace e-mail newsletters, benefiting both the sendee and the recipient. Amy Gahren, the author of this primer, claims that setting up an RSS is not technologically difficult. If that is indeed true, I think it is something campaigns should seriously consider utilizing as a replacement for the plethora of newsletters it typically sends out.

If an RSS feed truly works to centralize the news a person receives, then it could be one of the best things to happen to Internet communication in a long time.

a good kind of virus...

First there was Interruption Marketing, then Permission Marketing. Add Viral Marketing to the list and it's no wonder how much spam can accumulate in just a few days. Ireland and Nash's book points out that Viral Marketing differs from the others in that it is entirely peer to peer. It's a technique targeted to people who would never click on a banner ad and who even filter out e-mails from anyone who's name they don't recognize. Websites have discovered that people will listen to their friends. By simply adding a button labeled "Send this page to a Friend" it can significantly increase its hit count.

This concept reminds me of Ed Keller and Jon Berry's book, The Influentials, which Jonah Seiger mentioned in his lecture a few weeks back. The authors note that one of every 10 people is an influential, or the person that all of their friends go to for advice on the best restaurant, movie, etc. Websites have caught on to this idea. By supplying the send to a friend button, these influentials can now easily use cyberspace to show their friends why their candidate is best or to pass along an interesting article in the Post. I know that I frequently e-mail articles of interest to my family and friends.

As long as the websites do not abuse the system by then sending out unsolicited e-mails to both the recommender and the recipient, I think viral marketing is an easy and fantastic way to spread a message.

we interrupt your surfing for the following message...

Seth Godin coined the term "Interruption Marketing" to refer to techniques such as roadside billboards, or for the Internet age, pop-up ads. In other words, advertisements that cannot be easily avoided. Ireland and Nash discuss this term as well as Godin's other, preferrable, technique, "Permission Marketing," in Chapter 14 of their book.

Godin lauds Permission marketing as a much more effective technique because it attracts a websurfer to a message that they want to hear as opposed to placing a random message right in front of their face. In the age of Tivo and pop up blockers, permission marketing is a way to get your message heard by an increasingly busy and Internet savvy audience.

Campaigns which collect e-mail addresses by asking visitors to their website to sign up for e-mail updates can pinpoint who wants to receive their message. By asking a few questions, such as the person's zipcode, the candidate can send a personalized e-mail giving the voter the information most applicable to his or her life.

Commercial websites use the same techniques to show you ads that match your interests. Often when I visit yahoo.com I see a T-mobile ad. I always see it and wonder how yahoo could know that I use T-mobile. Is it because I used my yahoo e-mail account when I signed up for my contract?

More importantly, am I ok with the fact that by just entering a few pieces of data, the Internet paints a portrait of who you are as a consumer or a voter?