In this Special Episode, Joe and Martín discuss what changes you need to make to continue campaigning during a crisis, such as a hurricane, snowstorm, or a global health emergency like the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic.
In 2020, the global COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic struck the United States. Campaigns up and down the ballot had to start moving their operations online as social distancing became the norm. This period challenged us all to think outside the box to come up with new practices for voter outreach and deploy new fundraising tactics. In this Special Episode of How to Win a Campaign, Joe and Martín discuss how to safely adapt to a changing environment to keep building campaign momentum.
Resources
Navigating Your Political Campaign and Coronavirus
100+ Best Political Campaign Tools
Connect with us!
If you have campaign questions or want to learn more, reach out to us using the contact information below.
Twitter: @cmpwrkshp
Instagram: @TheCampaignWorkshop
Email: marketing@thecampaignworkshop.com
Joe Fuld
Twitter: @joefuld
Instagram: @joefuld
Martín Diego Garcia
Twitter: @gmartindiego
Instagram: @gmartindiego
Presented by The Campaign Workshop
(Intro Music)
Joe Fuld (00:05):
Hey friends, you're listening to how to win a campaign where you'll get an insider's perspective on not only how to run for office but how to a win, I'm Joe Fuld.
Martín Diego Garcia (00:16):
And I Martín Diego Garcia, and you can find us on Twitter @CMPWRKSHP and @thecampaignworkshop on Instagram. Thanks for tuning into today's special episode around campaigning when disaster strikes.
Joe Fuld (00:30):
So today we'll be talking about navigating a crisis, not a crisis specific to your campaign, but a larger societal crisis like COVID-19 or hurricanes or a massive snow storm. It's a time with political campaigns and groups of organizations where we're all really trying to figure out how do you engage and connect with people during a time that where you can't leave your house.
Martín Diego Garcia (01:00):
Yeah, really, I mean like a crisis like this pandemic or a hurricane or some natural disaster, right. Really impacts a variety of aspects of everyday life and more so even when in campaign life, I mean, Joe, where do you even recommend folks begin when something like this happens?
Joe Fuld (01:14):
Well, I think you begin by erring on the side of safety, right? First thing you want to do is make sure your constituents are safe, your team is safe, that you are really looking towards protecting people every way you can. And then I think the other thing you want to look at is public service. I mean when you are running for office specifically, people are looking for leadership and so now is actually a time in which elected or unelected folks can really show leadership and that's everything from doing food drives to making sure that people have publicly available information on what to do to get tested and to get the healthcare that they need. Those are the first things. And then as far as organizations go, it's also reaching out to your membership, making sure they have what you need, making sure that offices are closed, people are engaged and safe and that people have the resources if they need to work from home, that they can actually work from home.
Martín Diego Garcia (02:13):
Yeah, I couldn't agree more. I mean, as I think about when we train folks to run for office, we're always telling them to center their constituents and their voters and their community first, right? The campaign is not about them. It's about them being a public servant and ultimately hopefully a public elected official. And so how are you continuing to center what is top of mind for your community? Whether that's people losing their jobs, whether that's the safety, whether that's the social distancing and ensuring that folks who are being isolated are mentally staying healthy and emotionally staying healthy. And so how do you use your leadership in your role in the community and the campaign to continue to do that and show that even as a citizen right now, you're showing public leadership that and therefore can probably show elected public leadership as well.
Joe Fuld (02:56):
Yeah, I mean, I think that leadership is important and then you're in a place, an unprecedented place for a political campaign and for political nonprofit organizations where if you're dealing with elections, you then ask to figure out when is the election actually going to happen? Is, are there going to be absentee ballots that are sent down? Are they sent out on the same calendar? Is the primary pushed back? How are ways that you can get that information out to the general public? So people have what they need. And we've seen during this COVID-19 crisis where we have had primaries be pushed back, secretaries of state push out and mail out more absentee ballots to folks. We've also seen folks have concerns about mail delivery and we as a company have had to really check in with our vendor partners and with the U.S. Postal Service and with freight carriers to be able to push out as much information when we can, as what is real and what is not. We've seen, you know, things like delays in approving digital advertising. So the world changes a bit. And both organizations as well as companies like ours have to really pivot to provide information as quickly and as seamlessly as we can.
Martín Diego Garcia (04:18):
As Joe said earlier, right? The primary concern is keeping your community and your team safe. And, and that often means in terms of sensitivity to whatever the issue may be that is happening, whether it's conveyed or a natural disaster, right, is usually going to mean cancellation or postponement of any type of in-person fundraisers, rallies, town halls, meet and greets, et cetera. But there are alternatives, right? And we'll jump into this a little bit later, but you want to be thinking about how can you move some of these things to virtual video calls or phone meetings? How do you move these to virtual rallies? How do you utilize things as SMS and text messages in order to communicate with folks? I think luckily we now live in an age where technology is basically in every household or people have access to it in a multiple different ways and there are multiple different opportunities, whether it's social media or phone calls or texting, that folks can still connect and communicate with one another. And we really need to be able to adapt in this time of a disaster to figure out different creative ways for us to continue to keep our community safe and continue to communicate with the folks that we need to in order to win our elections.
Joe Fuld (05:25):
We've seen groups and organizations do different things like everything from virtual meetings using zoom, Facebook Live, telephone town halls, virtual rallies. We've seen people sort of upped the level of texting to their communities and to their members. And so the whole core about this and that safety is up the level of communication. Things are gonna change. They're going to change quickly. You need to be a part of that solution. You've got to focus your community needs. And what you've got to do is, as Martín said, put people first. Be cautious.
Martín Diego Garcia (06:05):
Yeah, absolutely. And that doesn't mean that you're, you're switching your entire campaign, right? Just to talk about COVID-19 or to just talk about a hurricane or to just talk about whatever the disaster is. But what you really want to be doing is sort of pivoting your message to be hopeful and aspirational. Right? Like, yes, you have to deal with the concerns in the immediate and sort of what people are thinking about in terms of healthcare and jobs and housing and all of those important sort of basic life necessities. But eventually folks are gonna switch and they're gonna want to hear a vision for a future. And how you in that elective office is going to ensure that your community is better equipped to respond to something like this in the future. That your community is ready to have more healthcare workers, quicker response times for rapid responses, a better plan in place and better structure in place so that the ripples of the effects of this damage, right, aren't as expansive. And so how do you utilize this time to craft a message around that? How does your, how is your leadership going to ensure that your community has a better outcome, God forbid, right, te next time this happens.
Joe Fuld (07:10):
As you're saying, Martín, and I think the key is just be thoughtful, right? Really think through how you're helping and not hurting. How it's not about you, how it's about the voter, how you're really connecting with people and providing them, whether it's your staff, whether it's your team, whether it's your members, the information that they need. So what we'll do is return to this. We'll take a break and we'll come back and talk about ways that you can change your campaign and respond in a natural disaster.
(Music)
Martín Diego Garcia (07:48):
And we're back, as Joe mentioned, a couple of the tools and strategies you all should be thinking about when campaigning during a disaster. We're gonna do a little bit of a deeper dive into sort of thinking about how to use virtual tele town halls SMS text messaging, and some other tools in your campaign as this happens. So aside from voting, what are some of the biggest things that change for a campaign during a crisis like COVID-19 Joe?
Joe Fuld (08:14):
Well, so the first thing is no door to door. For the longest time when I have trained folks to run for office, I say you need to, the most important thing is to go out and knock on doors. And that's really off the table. As I'm sitting here today. I would not recommend to any campaign be out there knocking on doors at all. Instead, what you want to be doing is figuring out how are you engaging the community and engaging people in alternative ways. We've seen people do everything from hosting virtual events to calling through supporters and members to make sure they're and see if they have needs. Using phone banks, virtual phone banks through things like VoteBuilder to talk to people about changes in election dates, changes in voting, regulations around vote by mail and early vote. So you're pushing information out from the campaign that is really useful. And then getting into things like Facebook live, making sure that your either interviewing people on Facebook live or even if you're the candidate from home, having a very clear message about what you're talking about, not just winging it, but being very thoughtful in that Facebook live and engaging with people,
Martín Diego Garcia (09:37):
Yeah. No, I think we've seen this from a number of candidates, whether it was Beto O'Rourke's run for president Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, she uses sort of Facebook Lives and Instagram Lives very, very well. To really tap into sort of what is happening on the ground. It really video is going to be really critical in this time where we can't sort of be in, in person with one another, but you're still sort of able to recreate that one on one conversation with folks or that, that intimacy with folks to really let them know who you are as a candidate.
Joe Fuld (10:07):
And so there's so many ways now to use video and I actually think that this is something that organizations and campaigns can really think thoughtfully about. Now what are they doing as far as organic video, user generated content? What are ways that they're getting that out? So we immediately think of Facebook Lives, but Instagram, LinkedIn, so many places that you can put video on the idea of hosting video on your own site using a tool like Vimeo Pro or Wistia to have bits of video that you're putting on there. And then putting it up on YouTube and having YouTube videos, really looking at these different ways in which you're engaging and then promoting those videos, putting them out. That is a way that you really should be thinking about communicating. And I think people have spent as campaigns less time on organic as then they should. So now is an opportunity and a necessity where whether you're an organization or a political campaign, you really need to be thinking about how are you leveraging organic video to get your message out.
Martín Diego Garcia (11:16):
Yeah, I mean, so Joe, what are some other organizing ideas or organized organizing alternatives when folks can't go door to door that you've seen being used successfully?
Joe Fuld (11:27):
So I'll go from the micro to the macro. So the micro, the idea of making sure you're upping that level of communicating with your volunteers and your teams. And that's everything from using a WhatsApp to create a WhatsApp group for your, your best volunteers or Slack to communicate on what's going on online. And I just want to say we have a list of a lot of these where we put together COVID-9 post that's up on The Campaign Workshop Blog. We'll also put it in the show notes, but check that out at thecampaignworkshop.com but then things like using event Bright and creating an online event or forum and getting people to sign up using zoom and having a zoom call that goes out thinking of doing more than one thing at once. We've actually had candidates that have like simulcasts a zoom on with a Facebook Live, which can get challenging and how you do that. But the idea of trying to get a message out through video is super important and super great, but you want to think about what are the tools that your organization or campaign are gonna use to connect with folks where they are. And that could be on Facebook, that could be on their phone, however you're doing it. And then I, I like the idea of like old school telephone town halls that actually works really well. Pushing out with a, you know, robocall to say when a candidate or a president of a union is going to be on a call with members and setting that time up using other ways to promote it, promoting it on digital with digital ads. Those types of things are all really important and can make a huge difference in the campaign
Martín Diego Garcia (13:17):
For some of this, these tools and things is we're throwing out things like I'm Wistia or I've seen people start using Twitch, which is normally used for video gaming to start doing some virtual learning sessions. It may be a really steep learning curve for some folks and so if you all have questions about how these are utilized or, or strategies in which you can use them in your campaign, always continue to feel free to reach out to us and if we don't have the information, we're happy to connect you. But as you said, right, like digital strategy is also going to be really, really important for your campaign. Particularly as a lot of folks are going to be at home and if they're at home, they're likely going to be online. Whether it's on their computer, on their phone, whether they're streaming digital TV, whether they're streaming digital radio, right? So as we're thinking about digital advertising, you also want to know that as you are thinking about it, all the other campaigns are thinking about it too, right? And the inventory online is not infinite, right? And so you want to be thinking about how are you going to be expecting higher costs per impressions or higher cost per click rates, because a lot of people are going to be saturating that market. And so you need to be, start thinking in the immediate and long term in terms of what are your ad buys going to look like where, and how are you going to be placing them? A lot of people are going to be home watching binge watching Hulu or Netflix like I am. And so how do you think about streaming on connected TV? People aren't going to be in their cars driving to work or commuting back and forth, right? So it's not necessarily uh maybe traditional radio, but you may want to sort of switch that and think about what are in people's homes such as Spotify or Pandora or podcasts and how do you connect there and really do an ad buy that it's going to be engaging on those platforms.
Joe Fuld (14:55):
And the messaging also matters a great deal, right? You, you can't just take the same messaging that you had before and then put it out on these platforms because it might not work. It might not be relevant to your audience. You actually want to make sure now that you're really focused on a relevant message. So how are you talking to people about the toll on small business? What are you doing as far as engaging with people about the things that they're thinking about, not what just what you're thinking about. So you have to pivot your message a little bit. Again, it's really thinking about your message box. You can check out content that we've talked about, but really thinking about your overarching message of the campaign. How does it now relate during this crisis and how are you engaged, engaging people around how you're going to be the help they need in office.
Martín Diego Garcia (15:47):
Yeah. And, and think about how are you making, whether it's text messaging or tele town halls or your digital work as engaging as possible. There's a lot of tools and techniques out there that folks are using. I know there's the ask me anythings on Instagram and some of these other social media platforms where folks just put in a bunch of questions and then you in real time sort of answer them back as people come as they come in. And you're allowed to post them as like an Instagram story. So how are you utilizing some of these tools or things that are already natural to some of these platforms and turning them or adapting them to work for your campaign?
Joe Fuld (16:23):
Yeah, and what I'd say is, think of the new school tools and then think of the old school tools, right? Emails still works, same people email give, but make sure it's the right information with the right message, picking up the phone and calling people. Make sure you have a list of people that you're going to call at this time. You're not likely asking them for money, but what you want to do is call your supporters and your friends and people around your campaign. Make sure they're okay. If you're an organization, you want to make sure you're figuring out how you're calling your members and engaging with them. And so thinking of like old school phone banks calling circles, ways that you're engaging, you want to utilize those old school tools as well as those new school tools.
Martín Diego Garcia (17:06):
Definitely. And I think ultimately we're just going to have to be flexible, right? Whether it's a pandemic or a natural disaster, things are going to be changing really, really quickly and you really need to be able to adapt to what is going to be happening. Right? And so as you're thinking about your managing your campaign team, right? Right now I would imagine a lot of us are working from home. So that means you're going to have to think about, right? Look at your processes, look at your systems. Do folks have everything that they need in their homes in order to perform their job functions? And also making sure that you're balancing and creating a culture of empathy, knowing that during a time of disaster or during a time of a pandemic, other things outside of the campaign may be weighing heavily on your staff, right? And so how are you balancing them taking care of while also them performing the functions of their job. So you want to be flexible, you want to be thinking holistically. You want to be looking at all of your different processes for your team.
Joe Fuld (17:58):
So we'll come back in a minute and talk and do a wrap up here, but you really want to think about what your campaign looks like as social distancing might become more the norm. Give us a minute, we'll come back. We'll do wrap up.
(Music)
Joe Fuld (18:17):
Hey, and we're back. So one of the things that Martín and I have been talking a lot about is just what do you do when disaster strikes? So talk to me about what are your main takeaways to do with the campaign during a larger crisis?
Martín Diego Garcia (18:35):
Yeah, I think we've talked about this, right? So being flexible, things are going to continue to change and you're going to have to adapt. I mean, campaigns have changed over decades. Whether it was because radio entered people's houses to TV to the way we interact on digital. This is just another way that campaigns are going to have to be changing. And that that change is going to impact the way you're doing organizing, your organizing tactics, how you're communicating with folks virtually by phone, by text message instead of in person. It's going to affect your timing, right? What does it mean now when you're not going to have that in-person ability for your timeline of when things need to go out as folks are going to maybe start moving to mail-in ballot and not just election day ballot and we're going to see those percentages of folks who are doing absentee or mail and ballot increase. Right. How does your mail program have to now start sooner? How does your digital program now have to start sooner?
Joe Fuld (19:27):
Yeah, I mean, and there will be other natural disasters that affect political campaigns. In 2018 we had hurricanes and we really had to work with clients to move mail around to stop mail and start mail again. I mean, the most important thing is you want to make sure that your team is safe, that you're really looking after your team. But a political campaign and nonprofit organizations are always going to be thinking about budget and timing and safety. And you'll want to continue to do that. You've got to prioritize people's needs.
Martín Diego Garcia (20:03):
And that also means, right, that fundraising strategies are going to change, right? So I would imagine you, if you're a candidate running right now, are really feeling that impact in terms of where people are really putting their money. A lot of the money that is going to help with this pandemic or folks are losing their jobs or know a loved one that is losing their jobs. The money that may have come to you originally may not be there anymore. And so you have to really think about what are other ways that you can streamline cut funding or cut expenses so that you can focus as much as possible on direct voter contact with your community and your constituents.
Joe Fuld (20:40):
Yeah, and the communication's the key. That's so important. Let your teams know. Talk to everyone that's involved in your campaign. Let them know you're going to have to make tough decisions. That might mean pausing people that you were going to hire, hiring them later or not hiring them at all. It might mean that you're spending less money on communications instead of being on multiple mediums for communications. You might just be choosing one, and so really thinking about that and engaging around that is so important.
Martín Diego Garcia (21:14):
I completely agree and I'm thinking in terms of the messaging pieces, right? What we don't want to happen is for, for whatever the issue is, whether it's a pandemic, whether it's a hurricane rate to become a political pawn, right. To be to for folks to start playing politics with folks' lives. And I don't think any of your constituents are going to want to see you as that type of leader where you, you sort of enter the bickering fight. Right and sort of lines are drawn and it becomes a wedge issue or a divisive issue when it really should be a unifying time, right? We should be thinking about how your campaign is utilizing its, its resources, its infrastructure, its connection to the community to really help bring the community together and unify folks and help each other out in a time of crisis and a time of hardship versus jumping into the political fights and bickering on both sides of the aisle in terms of policy or strategy. When really your focus should be on, on making sure that your community is staying safe and healthy and getting through this.
Joe Fuld (22:09):
Yeah. And you want to be a force for good. And so if you have questions about this, if there's ways that we can be helpful, please, one, drop us a note, but also check out the stuff that we've been writing around this. That's up on the website at thecampaignworkshop.com we hope you and your family are safe during this time. We look forward to talking to you again soon, and thanks for tuning in to this special episode. Until next time, this is Joe Fuld
Martín Diego Garcia (22:37):
And this is Martín Diego Garcia breaking down how to win a campaign.
Joe Fuld (22:42):
How to Win a Campaign is Joe Fuld, Martín Diego Garcia, Hope Rohrbach, Daniel Lam, Heidi Job, and Elena Veatch. Music by Mike Pinto. Sound editing by Junto Media. Special thanks to the team at The Campaign Workshop. Please review, like and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
(Outro Music)