5 Online Ways To Connect With Voters

It may be the dog days of summer, but political candidates should make sure they are staying on top of their campaign activities and making themselves visible to the public.

If you’re planning an election that’s still months away, there are a variety of tasks to do, from creating campaign material to scheduling events.

Here are five things you can do right now to connect with voters – without even going outside.

Engage through social media

People are home and spending more time engaged online. To reach them, it’s important to have an active social media presence. Your posts don’t all have to be political. Provide information from your local and state government, along with relevant local news. Share human interest stories about those in your area that are making a difference. Be a leader and show that you, too, are effected by what is going on in the wider community.

Enhance your email outreach

Use this time to grow your email list. Encourage people to sign up through your website and social media accounts. The sooner you can start growing your own email list, the better. There are many email marketing vendors that allow you to create and send emails to subscribers for free. As you grow your email list, you will find that it will become your campaign’s most valuable asset.

Get into the routine of sending emails a few times a week, sharing relevant updates and information that you might use for social media updates. You can increase this amount as you get closer to Election Day.

Hold a Facebook Live event, anywhere and anytime

Facebook Live a live video streaming service. It lets anyone broadcast from their cell phones straight to their Facebook News Feed. Doing a live video requires a good Internet connection and the ability to speak well into a camera. Viewers can leave reactions and comments while you are streaming. You can respond to them in real time. Themes for Facebook Live events include: ‘Virtual Town Hall’, ‘Lunch with the Candidate’, ‘Virtual Walks’, ‘Ask Me Anything’ – anything you can think of.

When you are finished, you can embed your videos into your campaign website.

Host virtual fundraisers

A virtual fundraiser is an online fundraising event. It can help compensate for the lack of real-world fundraising events. For example, you can combine fundraising with a virtual “Lunch with the Candidate” event for a closed audience. In many ways, planning a virtual fundraiser is like planning any other event. Establish your goals, organize your team, make a budget and plan the event itself. It doesn’t all have to be you. You can have guests, even entertainment.

Want people to show up? It’s critical to promote your virtual events and fundraisers. Engage your social media contacts and use your email list to reach out with reminders. Paid advertising on Facebook can also help spread the word. If you have street addresses, you can even use IP Targeting to reach voter households.

Engage in peer-to-peer messaging

Peer-to-peer messaging (or person-to-person or P2P messaging) is when two or more people communicate over text messaging. Peer-to-peer fundraising can exponentially increase your organization’s reach. It allows volunteers to manage hundreds of text message conversations with your contacts. Messages to your contact list come from volunteers, so recipients are more likely to take action. Texting is a great way to touch base with your supporters with relevant updates or information.

Combined, these online methods can help you form a cohesive strategy for effective remote outreach.

Here are additional services and resources to help your virtual campaign:

Need your social media accounts set up? We offer Social Media Setup as an add-on service to our political website packages.
By matching physical addresses to specific online IP addresses, IP Targeting becomes your way to directly reach voters.
Check out our Running for Office Podcast Series.