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Posted on 10/08/2003 5:52:32 PM PDT by JAWs
Dean`s rivals in the Democratic presidential primary are now asking themselves how a former governor from Vermont raised so much support online and how they can do the same.
“There`s a saying, ‘Never get in a bar fight with someone who has a lot less to lose,`” said Walsh by way of explanation. “Dean had nothing to lose.”
Dean was open to new tactics, such as creating a campaign “blog” or Web log, to update supporters on campaign-trail happenings, building an e-mail list of supporters, and using online forums such as Meetup.com to organize rallies and other backing.
Using the new tools paid off in a big way. Dean has collected close to $25 million so far this year, more than any other Democratic presidential hopeful. His campaign has also signed 460,000 supporters, mostly through the Internet.
“A lot of the other campaigns are trying to do similar things and aren`t having similar degrees of success,” said Nicco Mele, Dean`s webmaster.
“I`m sure the other candidates are watching the stuff that`s happening in the online world,” he said. “It`s almost all new territory. It`s like we have a model that is tried and true and totally works.”
Michael Liddell, Sen. Joseph Lieberman`s (D-Conn.) Web guru, acknowledged that his campaign has borrowed Dean`s tactics, such as using a Web log, but added that his boss uses it differently.
“When you look at the Dean blog, you see they use it as a ‘rah rah` thing that is cheerful and supportive of the candidate,” said Liddell.”
While the Dean campaign has used empowering language to convince supporters they can “take back the country,” Lieberman plans to use the language of integrity to attract people, Liddell said.
“We`re going to try out some tactics and see” what works, he said.
Liddell said the Lieberman campaign hired him two months ago to ease the “growing pains” of becoming fully modernized.
While Dean raised roughly $7 million dollars over the Internet since the end of June, the next most successful Democrat in the third-quarter money chase, Kerry, raised only $4.5 million to $5 million in total during that period. Lieberman (D-Conn.) and Rep. Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.) each raised about $4 million and Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) collected $3 million.
Walsh, Kerry`s adviser, said Dean has been so much more successful raising Internet money because of his early start.
“Dean sucked a lot of the early money out of the Net,” he said. “Dean reached out to a lot of lists early. He said, ‘I`m outside the party, you have to go with me.`”
“When Kerry showed up, people were like, ‘Keep asking me, maybe I`ll believe you on the eleventh e-mail.`”
But the theory that Dean has a monopoly on Internet donors because of his early start is undercut by the torrid start of retired Gen. Wesley Clark`s presidential campaign.
Clark reported raising $3.5 million within two weeks of declaring his candidacy late last month, two-thirds of that amount through the Internet.
Dean has done other things to maximize his online fundraising punch, like reinvesting money into expanding donor lists and paying “bloggers” or professional Internet surfers to keep the enthusiasm up on his website.
Dean aides say their Internet efforts have been so successful because their candidate has been willing to expose the inner workings of his campaign to supporters, similar to the tactic Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) employed when he ran for president in 2000.
McCain gave political reporters almost unlimited access to him as he traveled across the country on his bus, the Straight Talk Express. Soon afterward, rival campaigns and media critics complained about journalists falling in love with him.
“People feel very invested in the campaign, they know all the staffers names and they follow the campaign on the blog,” said Mele, Dean`s Internet adviser. “Supporter feel they are on the inside of the campaign. ... When you feel you really are a part of it, then of course you`re going to give money.”
However, doing so requires that candidates and staffs have less control of the message.
“It`s really asking a lot of traditional staffers,” said Walsh, with the Kerry campaign.
Walsh is scheduled to talk at 6:30 p.m. today at the National Press Club about the impact of the Internet on politics, an event sponsored by the New Media Society of Washington, D.C.
Again, the money quote...
Dean has done other things to maximize his online fundraising punch, like reinvesting money into expanding donor lists and paying “bloggers” or professional Internet surfers to keep the enthusiasm up on his website.
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Is he saying what I think he's saying?
Sounds like a New Media Strategy to me. I want those people to offer me a job.
All this refers to is the OFFICIAL site blog. This does not mean he has been paying outside bloggers to blogwhore for him. The OFFICIAL Howard Dean blog is part of the Howard Dean campaign; anyone working on the blog is contributing to the campaign just as much as any other staffer, paid or not.
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