Volunteers are the life-blood of any campaign. Whatever the campaign level, regardless of the cash on hand, volunteer engagement is the single greatest indicator of the health of a campaign. But, that doesn't mean that recruiting, training and managing them is easy. In fact, it's one of the most difficult jobs within a campaign.
If you want to find ways to help conservatives win, this post is for you. You can download our free infographic and we'll dig a in deep to explain why each of these 9 tips have such a huge impact!
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Whether you are a volunteer looking for ways to support your favorite candidate, someone who wants to eventually find a paid political job, or a campaign needing help with directing existing volunteers, our free download will help you!
We've designed this "9 Ways to Help Conservatives Win, Today" infographic to be easily sharable and give simple instructions on the most valuable services for any campaign.
Share - Show - Tell
It may seem like the only endorsements that matter are from celebrities or folks with deep pockets but campaigns need public support of all types. Endorsing your candidate is easy and it's powerful! And there are multiple ways you can make an endorsement.
- Share: Give the campaign permission to use your name as a public endorsement. Whether you own a small business, are active in your church or help with the local PTA, people know who you are and respect your opinion. Allowing the campaign to use your name in advertising and supporter lists gives credibility through the strength of their numbers, as well as specific persuasive power to anyone in your network. It also benefits you by helping you grow your influence!
- Show: Advertising and building name ID cost candidates huge amounts of money but most don't come with a personal connection. By displaying a yard sign, bumper sticker or social media avatar in support of your candidate, the value of your endorsement is significantly multiplied.
- Tell: Lending your name to the campaign and showing a yard sign are important but they're also fairly passive. The next step is to show active support for your candidate! This can include anything from sharing information about them through social media to writing a letter to the editor of a local paper or offering to speak in their support at a gathering.
Sweat Equity
Good, ol' fashioned campaign volunteering...nothing beats it! Political campaigns are hard work; and like most things worth doing, nothing much is accomplished without a solid team.
- Take out the trash: Seriously. On a campaign, no job is too small to get your foot in the door to help! While it sounds a whole lot more glamorous to say... Think of it this way: what better way to prove your dedication to the cause than by selflessly running to get coffee, doing hours of essential data entry, licking thousands of envelopes, helping out at events, or by being the campaign HQ gopher?
- Make a deposit at the Phone Bank: Phone-banking can seem scary to the un-initiated but in reality it's a simple, effective means of reaching large amounts of voters. Many campaigns even have the ability for you to phone-bank from your home! That means that you can help the candidate of your choice, whether they're across town or across the country. Volunteers are powerful advocates for their candidate and direct conversations with voters give you the chance to imbue others with your passion!
- Pound the Pavement: There is no more important role for a campaign volunteer than to be a member of the door-to-door program. Full stop. Direct voter contact has been proven time and again to be the #1 most effective way for campaigns to utilize volunteers. It can be hard work, especially in very cold or hot climates, but there's no better way to get a vote than to have a personal conversation at the voters door.
Make It Rain
Money is the mothers-milk of politics. It takes money to buy stamps, pay for a website, buy fliers, order pizza for volunteers...you get the picture. Every campaign needs to raise money and it's hard work.
- Give personally (no amount is too small!): Get some skin in the game and put your money where your mouth is by making an individual donation to the campaign. Small donations help grow the number of individual donors a campaign has and lowers the average donation amount. Both of those statistics have become powerful metrics for campaign momentum in the last few years. Your small donation, even only a dollar or two, can help build that track record!
- Ask others to donate: Having already made a donation yourself, become an ambassador of the campaign to others in your network who are supportive. In many cases, social pressure closes the deal here… especially when it’s clear that no amount is too small. Even if you can only give a few bucks, leverage your willingness to contribute the proverbial 'Widow's mite' to encourage others to do likewise.
- Volunteer for the campaign finance team: Directly help the campaign raise money by volunteering at a fundraising event, working sign-in sheets, setting up fundraising coffee meet-and-greets, stuffing follow-up envelopes, etc. The finance team are some of the most important campaign ambassadors and work to help convince others to contribute financially. Your passion and engagement, not the size of your wallet, are the key factors in success here.
As a volunteer, we challenge you to find a campaign and try to do something in each of these 9 categories to help them win this Fall. You'll be a rockstar volunteer and any campaign would love to have that kind of support!
[…] sure to use the power of the thank you when interacting with staff, volunteers, voters, and […]