Posted on 03/25/2015 1:35:37 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Donations to Ted Cruz's campaign, during his presidential announcement.
Ted Cruz's entire decision of whether to jump-start his presidential candidacy at the end of a fundraising quarter hinged on the ability to raise $1 million in the first week.
The Texas senator ended up hitting that milestone in just over a day.
Fueled by a team of 10 data scientists who are tasked with conducting real-time analysis of prospective supporters, the reach of and return on Cruz's rollout has already exceeded the initial expectations of even the campaign's top advisers.
While initial media reports detailed Cruz raising $500,000 on the first day, the candidate actually reached the $1 million marker near 2:30 A.M. Tuesday, just past the first crucial 24 hours since the campaign's launch on Twitter midnight Monday.
An avalanche of small dollar donations goosed the top line, according to data provided exclusively to U.S. News by the Cruz campaign.
Two-thirds of Cruz's initial contributions were under $100. Checks of less than $250 amounted to 95 percent of Cruz's rush to his first million.
Texas, unsurprisingly, was his top donor state, followed by California, Florida and Virginia.
Donations to Ted Cruz's presidential campaign, by location. The darker the color, the higher the concentration of donors.
But it wasn't only about shaking the money tree.
Because they were to be first to turn the ignition key on a 2016 candidacy, Cruz's political brain trust also sought to expand the scope of its rollout, beyond the customary single day flurry of media coverage. His advisors mapped out a carefully planned succession of events designed to build on each other and churn over a week's span of time.
On Saturday, word began to float out to reporters about an "important speech" Cruz would deliver on Monday at Liberty University. By Saturday night, Cruz's hometown newspaper, The Houston Chronicle, had nailed down the scoop: Monday morning was go-time.
But first, the tweets.
At 8:05 PM Sunday night, Cruz placed word on Twitter that "around midnight there will be some news you won't want to miss." Four hours and four minutes later, just after midnight Monday, he tweeted, "I'm running for President and I hope to earn your support!"
The tweet was viewed 1.1 million times and the ensuing Facebook post scored more than 800,000 views and reached 2.6 million.
Of course, not all the social media feedback was positive. On Yik Yak, the app for posting anonymous missives, there was plenty of griping and joking from Liberty students who were required to be there. Twitter and Facebook drew ample Cruz detractors as well, with many jabbing him for failing to own the rights to TedCruz.com and other websites bearing his name. Still, the overall optics of the announcement were favorable. He was also blessed with luck, of course. If the Germanwings plane had fallen out of the sky and into the French Alps a day sooner, it could've drained his coverage significantly.
"Nothing happened," a top Cruz strategist told U.S. News, almost exhaling in relief.
Following the Liberty University announcement, which dominated most of cable news Monday and showed Cruz basking before a youthful, exuberant audience, the candidate hopped on a plane not to Iowa or New Hampshire -- but New York. In addition to a fundraising event there, he did Sean Hannity's radio show as well as sat for the full-hour on his Fox News Channel primetime television program.
The next morning, even as Cruz was headed to NBC's Today Show for the first joint interview with his wife, Heidi, he still made the front pages of most of the major daily newspapers in Iowa and New Hampshire.
The outset of the Cruz endeavor is demonstrating how crucial analytics will be in building on his initial success. When Cruz sat for an interview with Fox's Megyn Kelly on Tuesday night, he pulled in 952 donors who contributed $70,486 as a result of the appearance, according to Cruz's data crunchers.
Visitors to TedCruz.org, during Ted Cruz's appearance on "The Kelly File."
The 10 staffers who hold PhDs in behavioral science or analytics monitored the profiles of those hitting the website during the Kelly interview and quickly redirected social media and Internet-based ad campaigns to maximize the output of their potential targets.
This graph shows how traffic to the Cruz website spiked during his Kelly appearance. He saw a similar, smaller bump -- yielding about $39,000 -- when he was on Glenn Beck's radio program in the morning, demonstrated in the graphic that follows.
Cruz's team believes their rollout sets a higher bar for the Republican aspirants who come after him -- namely, all of them.. He skipped the exploratory step, went right for the full announcement at a unorthodox time (at the end of a month and quarter) in which he visited neither his home state or an early nominating state. (He embarks on an early state tour -- guaranteed to suck up more media, next week.)
"Imagine Mike Huckabee doing an exploratory committee now. How much oxygen does that get?," challenged the Cruz strategist. "How do you announce and fly around your home state? What's that worth?"
Ironically, Cruz's bold move was in part, inspired by Jeb Bush, who initially announced his consideration of a presidential campaign in mid-December a few weeks before Christmas, when voters were busy, distracted and assumed to be focused on anything but politics.
Cruz's team eyed Bush's bold move and thought they could break the conventional timetable mold too.
Donors making contributions to TedCruz.org, during Cruz's appearance on Glenn Beck's radio show.
There's an unwritten rule in presidential politics that says a campaign shouldn't launch at the end of March, right before the fresh fundraising quarter of April. The rule dictates a candidate would want a full three-month cycle to raise money before having to report it out to the punditry.
"The rules this cycle," says the Cruz strategist, "are meant to be broken."
(VIDEO-AT-LINK)
10 Phd’s? Hopefully they are from Texas schools and not NE Liberal schools.
One of 172.
I feel honored!
You mea like Harvard or Princeton? LOL
Knows what he’s doing AND conservative. What a combination.
Almost makes you want to sign up for Obamascare :)
He’s going to get much more than that first million.
(rail gun pic)
[He’s going to get much more than that first million.]
Small givers will give in increments.
He’s also very social media savvy as well which is a great low cost means or reaching voters.
Verrrrry satisfying!
The CRUZ missile is already making liberal heads explode!!!!
“You mea like Harvard or Princeton? LOL”
Not sure how politics infiltrated the STEM programs at those schools. Then again, all these NE PHD’s in the Climate programs are doing a phenomenal job with their accurate forecasts on the weather.
Pretty cool, I’m actually working through the mitx data analytics class now. Nice to see some real world usage.
it shows outstanding insight on Cruz’s part. A good executive hires a good team.
And you should. Mine was less than $100.00.
Thank you.
I’m right there with you. It’s an honor to help such a great conservative man like Ted become President.
The darker reds in the northeast and Florida is telling.
A Super Cruz Tsunami in the making.
He should have had those domain names long ago.
My husband and I agreed that on every payday he’ll get another donation. We’ve called it an investment in our future.
I think you missed 2d’s point: Cruz went to Princeton and Harvard.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.