How Digital Advertising Can Impact Your On-the-Ground Political Campaign
Whether you’re for running the local school board, city council, or a state congressional seat, all political campaigns must have a strong digital presence. The power of a robust digital political campaign is not to be taken lightly, as it can help boost your on-the-ground efforts and increase the reach of your campaign messaging. Best of all, digital campaigning is a lot easier than handing out flyers all day long.
Here’s a closer look at how some digital tactics can elevate your campaign and put your ahead of the competition.
Go Beyond Facebook
Social is a fun, interactive way to communicate with your supporters. But don’t lean on it too heavily, as it’s still very limiting when it comes to voter connection outside the platform. Programmatic advertisers like FieldTest can help you expand your reach beyond the social realm, allowing you to connect with more voters and help activate them on-the-ground – whether you’re leading them to voting stations, directing them to a rally, or simply getting out the vote.
Target Your Audience
With digital marketing, you can harness the power of data to target the audience most interested in your campaign messaging. When you integrate political targeting, consumer segments, and geofencing, you can effectively engage voters in a hyper-local location and get your message to constituents that want it most. More importantly, targeting erases the guesswork, allowing you an easy way to encourage your supporters in your area to get out the vote for you on Election Day.
Many Places at Once
Sometimes your campaign will require you to be two places at once. With digital marketing, you can be two, three, or ten places at once. An effective digital campaign takes the stress out of your on-the-ground tactics, allowing you to activate multiple voting demographics with multiple forms of platform messaging. With a smart digital campaign, you can help mobilize constituents and spread awareness for a rally all at the same time.
Build a Great Website
Believe it or not, your website can greatly impact your on-the-ground efforts. As the world goes more and more mobile, you’ll want a simple, scannable website that allows people to connect with your campaign platform from anywhere. With a well-designed website, you’ll make it easy for voters to learn about your platform, stay up to date with your campaign, and share your web link with other constituents they meet on the street. These links will prove invaluable, as voters will share your message with other constituents (and on social) and practically do the work for you.
Use the Funnel Approach
If you’re running a digital political campaign, the sales funnel approach is a must-have tactic for your arsenal. Like digital advertising, it’s imperative you make voters aware of you before asking for their vote (or donation dollars!). Treat your outreach like a sales funnel, taking constituents from awareness, to consideration, to conversion. At the awareness stage, you may just want to get the word out about an issue or platform. Moving into consideration, you could push a bit further and activate voter engagement by showing them what sets you apart. And for conversion, you can invite them to a rally at the local community center, where you can meet them, greet them, and hopefully win their vote.
Closing Thoughts
Not all these tactics may be relevant to your campaign, but we hope they shed a little more light on the importance of a strong digital presence in your political campaign. With the right digital efforts (and bit of testing), you’ll be able to connect with more constituents, elevate your political message, and make your election a success on all fronts.
If you’re looking for more ways to take your political campaign to the next level, contact us and see how FieldTest can help. You can also learn more about our capabilities here.