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Walking Precincts

I knew a candidate several elections back who had a doctorate and was a professional numbers-cruncher.  He ran for office and lost the first time out, but he didn’t want the experience to go to waste.  So, he did a statistical analysis of the work  his campaign had made in each precinct and compared it to expectations based on parameters such as voter registration and efforts in similar precincts.  The bottom line of his very detailed analysis was that he gained a significant number of votes in precincts that he personally walked.   His campaign volunteers walked a lot of precincts, but there wasn’t a significant gain in votes in those precincts.  That may have been because the strategy was ineffective or because some of the volunteers were ineffective.  Volunteers who think they are running a door-to-door debating team can sometimes turn off the voters.  So, some volunteers may have gained votes and others may have lost votes.  There is no way to be sure, but the overall volunteer precinct-walking effort was pretty much a wash.

Phoning Voters

Now, the really interesting statistic he came up with was that he actually lost votes in precincts that his campaign phoned.  This confirmed a bias of mine against telephone campaigning.  I personally think more people are annoyed than convinced by unsolicited phone calls.  I guess all the big-time campaign strategists push the phone program, but just because everyone does it doesn’t mean it is a good tactic for your campaign. I hear from people all the time who hate those phone calls. I have a suspicion that one reason the huge phone program is included in all the big money campaigns is that some campaign firms make a lot of money from it.

The only time I think a phone program makes sense is if you need to respond to an attack from your opponent and it is too late to do it any other way.  It also might make sense as a way to remind voters of the election date in a special election where a low turnout is expected.  Otherwise, I think you’re wasting time and/or money with a big phone program, but I know there are others who will disagree.

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