An effective early voting campaign strategy does not fall apart when the first returns look bad. It uses those returns to make the campaign’s remaining voter contact more focused, efficient and effective.
Early-voting timelines and procedures vary significantly by state. The National Conference of State Legislatures tracks early in-person voting rules and schedules nationwide, with voting periods currently ranging from three to 46 days.
Campaigns spend months building turnout models, identifying supporters and planning their path to victory. Then early voting begins, someone opens the latest report and the entire team starts to panic.
The other side has returned more ballots. One county is underperforming. A key group of supporters is not voting at the expected pace.
Now what?
First, take a breath. Then look more closely at what the numbers are actually telling you.
Early-Vote Returns Are Not Election Results
Early-vote reports generally tell you who has cast a ballot. They do not tell you how each person voted.
Party registration, voter history and campaign data can help you estimate what may be happening, but an early lead in returned ballots is not the same thing as an early lead in votes.
That does not mean a campaign should ignore a troubling report. It means the response should be based on data rather than panic.
The first questions should be:
- Are our identified supporters returning ballots?
- Which geographic areas or voter groups are falling behind?
- Are reliable supporters waiting to vote on Election Day?
- How many persuadable voters remain in the universe?
- Are we still spending money contacting people who have already voted?
Once you answer those questions, the early-vote report stops being a source of anxiety and starts becoming a campaign tool.
Stop Contacting People Who Have Already Voted
Every new early-vote report gives your campaign an opportunity to make its voter-contact program more efficient.
Match the latest returns against your campaign’s universes and remove voters who have already cast a ballot. Unless there is a specific reason to continue communicating with them, your campaign should not keep spending money asking them to vote.
This sounds obvious. Yet campaigns frequently continue running calls, texts, mail and digital programs against outdated lists.
That wastes money and it can also frustrate voters who have already done exactly what the campaign asked them to do.
The universe should become smaller and more precise as Election Day approaches. Each new round of data should make the next round of voter contact smarter.
Segment the Voters Who Remain
The voters who have not yet cast a ballot should not all receive the same message.
A strong early voting campaign strategy separates them based on what the campaign already knows.
Identified supporters
These voters do not necessarily need more persuasion. They need a clear reason and a specific plan to vote.
Calls and texts can remind them about early-voting deadlines, provide polling information, help them locate their voting site or ask when they intend to cast their ballot.
A supporter who says, “I’ll vote Saturday morning,” is much more valuable than one who simply says, “Yes, I support the candidate.”
Undecided and persuadable voters
If an undecided voter remains in the universe, the campaign still has an opportunity to move that person.
This is where a live conversation can be especially useful. A trained caller can deliver a persuasion message, listen to the voter’s concerns and record the response.
Campaigns can then follow up with voters who appear open to supporting the candidate instead of continuing to treat every undecided voter the same way.
Voters you have not reached
No single form of voter contact will reach everyone.
Some voters will not answer the door. Others have opted out of campaign texts. Some ignore unfamiliar calls but will listen to a voicemail. Others may respond after seeing the same message reinforced through several different channels.
If an important voter segment is not responding, change the method of contact. Do not simply repeat the same tactic and hope for a different result.
Use Calls and Texts Together
Calls and texts should not operate as separate campaign projects.
Interactive texts can identify supporters, collect responses and deliver voting information quickly. Live calls allow campaigns to have deeper conversations, persuade undecided voters and secure specific vote commitments.
The information collected through one method should improve the next.
For example:
- Send an interactive text to identify supporters.
- Use live calls to reach voters who did not respond or need additional persuasion.
- Remove voters as early-vote data confirms that they have cast ballots.
- Follow up with identified supporters who still have not voted.
- Concentrate the final GOTV push on the people most likely to make a difference.
That is more effective than blasting the same message to the same list until Election Day.
A Real Early-Voting Campaign Strategy
When Alaska Governor Mike Dunleavy’s reelection campaign needed an aggressive voter-contact strategy, CampaignHQ helped execute five rounds of calls targeted to different groups of voters.
The campaign contacted absentee-ballot voters, delivered social-pressure messages encouraging supporters to return their ballots, directed early voters to nearby polling locations and made Election Day calls to supporters who had not yet voted.
The program included direct contact with 58,397 voters during the early-vote push and Election Day pressure calls that reached another 15,777 voters.
Dunleavy went on to win more first-choice votes than any other candidate and became Alaska’s first governor reelected in the 21st century.
The lesson is not simply that the campaign made a lot of calls. The calls changed as voting progressed. The campaign used the information available at each stage to reach the right voters with the right request.
Do Not Throw Out the Plan. Refine It.
An ugly early-vote report does not automatically mean your campaign is losing. It does mean you should understand who has voted, who has not and whether your supporters are on track.
Do not respond by contacting everyone more often.
Update the data, remove voters who have already cast ballots, separate supporters from persuadable voters, change tactics when people are not responding, give known supporters a specific plan to vote.
You do not need to win every day of early voting.
You do need to know who is left and have a plan to move them.
CampaignHQ can build and execute a coordinated early voting and GOTV program using live calls, texts, automated calls and live ringless voicemail. Talk to our team about the voters you still need to reach.