TALKING TACTICS by Deborah Savadge

Inez Milholland Boissevain riding astride in the March 3, 1913, suffrage parade in Washington, D.C., as the first of four mounted heralds. Retrieved from the Library of Congress

In SUFFS, the new Broadway musical which opened this week at the Music Box, a character says, “Progress is possible, but it’s not guaranteed.” For those of us who are alternating between hurling things at TV news and finding some way to prevent our country from sliding into autocracy, here are some tactics that might help.

A group of volunteers in California, now uses email to increase Democratic turnout in elections.  Roberts’ ultra-blue Bay Area group has joined with an inner-city Milwaukee cohort to conquer apathy and increase the number of Democrats who make it to the polls. 

In 2020, Jim Roberts and his team, Be A Voter 2024, have had measurable success. Studying past and present turnout, their volunteer statistician has calculated they may be responsible for getting 4,000 additional Milwaukee voters and as many as 8,000 of those voters’ friends and family members to the polls in 2020. Biden won Wisconsin by fewer than 20,000 votes.

Roberts continually tests the effectiveness of reaching voters online, using registration files to write to voters multiple times with a consistent message. About one-third of Milwaukee voters provide an email address when they register.  Be A Voter targets the poorest wards where Democratic registration is 75%, but turnout is historically low. Their goal is to get more of those voters to the polls. The ongoing challenge is getting email messages past the ever-changing spam filters.

His team aims a positive message, “Your Vote Matters,” at Democrats who are inclined to sit this one out. They want every voter to know, “You have the same number of votes as a billionaire.”

Breaking the Spam Barrier

Avoiding spam filters is key to launching an effective email campaign. Roberts and his organization have learned to avoid certain mass mail words, especially in headers. Words like  “Give,” “Now,” “donate” or “We’re begging,” send email to spam purgatory.  

One strategy for avoiding the spam sentries is to reduce the number of addresses in any bcc’d group. What is the magic number? This seems to be a closely-guarded secret. But smaller batches work better than massive lists. Senders can use their own or a friend’s email to test what gets relegated to SPAM and what does not.

A successful email operation requires creativity

The goal is to get your targets to open the email. Try testing a concise message: “JOE BIDEN supports unions,” may be more convincing than a message critical of the other guy. Put your core message in the header, so even if they don’t open your message, voters see, “JOE BIDEN fights to save OBAMACARE,” or “Biden and Harris will restore reproductive health care.”

Avoid images that reveal your letter to be a mass mailing. Google flags as Junk anything that looks like an ad. 

Suggest positive actions and always give voters a link to a site where they can learn more. If you are able to successfully build a team of volunteers, cut and paste to share messages and trade header suggestions so you can continue to vary the messages your recipient list receives. This will enhance your chances of getting through the dreaded spam filters. Be a Voter 2024’s web site, BeAVoter2024.com, provides strategies and inspiration. 

The guidelines are constantly being revised. So, what works for the primaries may not work over the summer and beyond.  Be A Voter briefly achieved a 45% open rate, but it dropped to 5% when algorithms changed. 

Roberts gives high marks to WISDEMS, describing them as the “best state party in the country for working with volunteers.” He also salutes Souls to the Polls for its effectiveness at turning out the Milwaukee vote. Red2Blue, https://www.red2blue.org/, is an east coast-based group that promotes turn-out-the vote communication.

Voter rolls provide addresses for every voter. Following up with post cards to likely voters remains a tried-and-true tool for notifying voters of important dates and generating excitement in our movement.

For Inspiration

The Broadway musical SUFFS is about Suffragists’ long struggle to win the right to vote. Hillary Rodham Clinton and Malala Yousafzai are among its producers. Its Playbill quotes the Talmud, “You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.”

Deborah Savadge is a playwright and Co-editor of WIT ONLINE. She serves as Literary Manager for Playwrights Gallery.