Internet Fund Raising Pays Off For Presidential Hopeful

from the a-sign-of-things-to-come dept

I’ll admit that I haven’t been paying much attention to Presidential election politics yet (trying to avoid it for as long as possible), but the one name I keep hearing come up in conversations concerning how the candidates use the internet is Howard Dean. Now he’s announced that he’s the first candidate to raise $1 million from online-only fundraising. While all the candidates are using the internet to some extent, Dean has really been focusing a lot of his efforts on the internet – which makes sense because he’s less well-known and doesn’t have the same offline fundraising powers as some of the more well-known candidates. I also have seen a number of articles about how Dean has embraced internet-organized rallies via Meetup. Not knowing anything about his politics, it is good to see any candidates learning to embrace the internet for what it allows them to do. Update: Wired is running an article about how Dean has embraced new technologies as well.


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Comments on “Internet Fund Raising Pays Off For Presidential Hopeful”

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2 Comments
Rick Klau (profile) says:

Dean and the net

Mike – It goes a lot further than just fundraising.

Governor Dean’s campaign has been a broad and deep embrace of the Internet. Consider:

  • They were the first presidential campaign to maintain a blog.
  • They were the first presidential campaign to use smartmob technology (through a service at upoc.com); volunteers receive SMS text messages about important announcements, campaign appearances, etc.
  • Their use of Meetup has resulted in over 25,000 citizens self-organizing for the campaign. (That number is more than 20 times larger than the next closest candidate.)
  • They’re relying on an eCRM company to help supporters host house parties (I hosted one at my house last month); users can manage contact lists, send invitations, manage contributions and send follow-ups – all from the website.
  • A just-released website using new high definition video technology allows supporters to passively download DVD-quality video from the campaign. (MSNBC covered this yesterday.)

In addition, they secured Rep. Zoe Lofgren’s endorsement early on – a critical supporter given her connections to Silicon Valley. Governor Dean’s campaign manager, Joe Trippi, is originally from San Jose and understands the important role the technology can play (he is a frequent contributor not just to the campaign’s blog but to other blogs as well).

These guys get it.

–Rick
(You can also visit my blog focused on the campaign here.)

Mitch Manzella (user link) says:

Re: Dean and the net

The is the absolute truth. I am the Middlesex County, NJ Coordinator and a Meetup leader for this campaign. I’ve had the honor of meeting Dean, and WOW… what a better country we would live in if this man was on the bridge.

Check out my website, I have a lot of Dean info with a lot of downloadable video as well.

— Mitch
http://mcmanzi.tripod.com

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