Why isn’t there a Democratic email strategy to message this? I’d guess that Democratic campaigns send literally hundred of millions of emails each week. None of them seem to have talking points, just begging for cash to eventually buy ads to display talking points. Just send 1 billion emails a month with key messages and CTA to share on FB / Twitter.
Excellent advice. "Talk like a human" includes avoiding the latest Washington lingo most outsiders don't use, e.g., "existential" and "woke" and "cancel culture."
Let’s all make an agreement. Every time we see a Democratic elected official (any office) have an interview or, say, a Sunday Show set piece and they get pulled into the weeds of where the votes are in the caucus, or some intricacy re the Parliamentarian, or some lie a Republican told, do this: email him or her a primer on how to answer the question. (Quickly dismiss the lie: “Sen Cruz doesn’t really believe that. Telling untruths is merely his way of arguing, or diverting attention from this — the bill is fully paid for, if you make less than $400,000 your taxes are not going up, and here are just a few of the benefits Americans will soon see…”)
Email your friends to do the same! Ask your facebook friends to do the same! Don’t tweet or just complain! Do something direct and specific to improve that official’s performance! Do it every time. Let’s get a movement started about this.
Good post today. As a union organizer making language accessible to everyday people is such a key ingredient to personal empowerment. I’ve found in my small corner of the world, collective bargaining and state level policy matters, generally people want to engage, but let’s face it the minutia and nuance to healthcare plan design or the particulars and procedures of lawmaking is by nature confusing and/or boring. When people brush up against that, they tune out and if you can’t engage ppl, they can’t help spread the word. Beyond making the language accessible and by that I mean taking all that nuance and when you taking to someone saying it to them in a way that it clicks. It can be hard, but there are top level ideas in this post and it’s on us to incorporate those into our conversations and personal platforms. The other thing I know for union organizing is extend the runway. Find ways to start talking abt these things for the longest amount of time possible before they actually happen. This way you can prime the pump and when these provisions go into effect ppl have awareness of the good they’ll do. And finally use metaphors: prime the pump, extend the runway, take the temperature, most ppl get metaphors but they have a personal meaning in their head which always help make your point stick a bit more. As has been said before, this is a big f*cking deal-and a long time coming. #solidarity
This is a fantastic messaging guide, and we need more of these. I've co-founded a digital organizing/messaging group, and we will be using this messaging, other Pfeiffer messaging, Anat Shenker-Osorio messaging, to amplify these messages as much as we can. www.moreperfectdemocracy.org or FB @moreperfectdemocracy, or Twitter @demspatriots. If you're interested in helping with messaging strategy for the grassroots/social media/relational organizing side get in touch. We, along with orgs like Demcast and others need this kind of guidance so we can pound the right messages and then amplify them over and over, even if we can't get the official orgs to do it properly. There's a lot of might to the grassroots activist wing. Let's use it as effectively as we can! Rant over.
After listening to PSA last night, THE big takeaway for me was the *bipartisan* unpopularity of Mitch McConnell. You questioned whether McConnell fired up voters enough for the midterms. Really? Did you see the $$ Amy McGrath raked in from everywhere?
Yes, I think a message about how Mitch and his leadership would stand between voters and the Biden policies they like (while simplistic) would resonate with voters. Better than turning the midterm elections into a Biden-Trump grudge match (though the former guy will try).
I try to avoid watching the news shows because, blood pressure, but it has always seemed to me that GOPers go on those shows or even go on record in print with one consistent message that they hammer home over and over. Dems go on those shows or go on record and get pulled off track, this one says this, that one says that and I am never not left with the feeling that they didn’t have any coaching on the bottom line message they needed to convey. Who is constructing Dem messaging and why does it seem like even the messengers haven’t gotten the message? Is it just my perception because I’m blinded by my need for them to win these fights?
Why isn’t there a Democratic email strategy to message this? I’d guess that Democratic campaigns send literally hundred of millions of emails each week. None of them seem to have talking points, just begging for cash to eventually buy ads to display talking points. Just send 1 billion emails a month with key messages and CTA to share on FB / Twitter.
Excellent advice. "Talk like a human" includes avoiding the latest Washington lingo most outsiders don't use, e.g., "existential" and "woke" and "cancel culture."
Let’s all make an agreement. Every time we see a Democratic elected official (any office) have an interview or, say, a Sunday Show set piece and they get pulled into the weeds of where the votes are in the caucus, or some intricacy re the Parliamentarian, or some lie a Republican told, do this: email him or her a primer on how to answer the question. (Quickly dismiss the lie: “Sen Cruz doesn’t really believe that. Telling untruths is merely his way of arguing, or diverting attention from this — the bill is fully paid for, if you make less than $400,000 your taxes are not going up, and here are just a few of the benefits Americans will soon see…”)
Email your friends to do the same! Ask your facebook friends to do the same! Don’t tweet or just complain! Do something direct and specific to improve that official’s performance! Do it every time. Let’s get a movement started about this.
Good post today. As a union organizer making language accessible to everyday people is such a key ingredient to personal empowerment. I’ve found in my small corner of the world, collective bargaining and state level policy matters, generally people want to engage, but let’s face it the minutia and nuance to healthcare plan design or the particulars and procedures of lawmaking is by nature confusing and/or boring. When people brush up against that, they tune out and if you can’t engage ppl, they can’t help spread the word. Beyond making the language accessible and by that I mean taking all that nuance and when you taking to someone saying it to them in a way that it clicks. It can be hard, but there are top level ideas in this post and it’s on us to incorporate those into our conversations and personal platforms. The other thing I know for union organizing is extend the runway. Find ways to start talking abt these things for the longest amount of time possible before they actually happen. This way you can prime the pump and when these provisions go into effect ppl have awareness of the good they’ll do. And finally use metaphors: prime the pump, extend the runway, take the temperature, most ppl get metaphors but they have a personal meaning in their head which always help make your point stick a bit more. As has been said before, this is a big f*cking deal-and a long time coming. #solidarity
This is a fantastic messaging guide, and we need more of these. I've co-founded a digital organizing/messaging group, and we will be using this messaging, other Pfeiffer messaging, Anat Shenker-Osorio messaging, to amplify these messages as much as we can. www.moreperfectdemocracy.org or FB @moreperfectdemocracy, or Twitter @demspatriots. If you're interested in helping with messaging strategy for the grassroots/social media/relational organizing side get in touch. We, along with orgs like Demcast and others need this kind of guidance so we can pound the right messages and then amplify them over and over, even if we can't get the official orgs to do it properly. There's a lot of might to the grassroots activist wing. Let's use it as effectively as we can! Rant over.
After listening to PSA last night, THE big takeaway for me was the *bipartisan* unpopularity of Mitch McConnell. You questioned whether McConnell fired up voters enough for the midterms. Really? Did you see the $$ Amy McGrath raked in from everywhere?
Yes, I think a message about how Mitch and his leadership would stand between voters and the Biden policies they like (while simplistic) would resonate with voters. Better than turning the midterm elections into a Biden-Trump grudge match (though the former guy will try).
I try to avoid watching the news shows because, blood pressure, but it has always seemed to me that GOPers go on those shows or even go on record in print with one consistent message that they hammer home over and over. Dems go on those shows or go on record and get pulled off track, this one says this, that one says that and I am never not left with the feeling that they didn’t have any coaching on the bottom line message they needed to convey. Who is constructing Dem messaging and why does it seem like even the messengers haven’t gotten the message? Is it just my perception because I’m blinded by my need for them to win these fights?