P2P texting has become one of the most efficient ways to reach voters and constituents. But how do you get them to text back? AAPC’s latest webinar featured a panel of texting professionals and campaign consultants who discussed how to boost engagement across multiple segments, relationship and rapport building over text, getting Gen Z and Millennials to engage, and utilizing P2P texting for GOTV and ballot chasing.
Check out the key lessons from the webinar below, and listen to the recording for even more expert insights.
This webinar has been archived for playback. AAPC members can click here to view all webinar archives.
Key Lessons from the Webinar
- Defining success: With more campaigns utilizing texting, voters are getting used to receiving multiple texts a day. Because of this, campaigns should have a multifaceted approach to measuring engagement. Measuring success of your texts depends on the overall goal. Are you using texts for fundraising? If so, then donations are the ultimate success metric, compared to the number of replies you receive. Similarly, if you are focusing on GOTV, you can exclude voters who have already voted from future messages, and that dropoff in the audience numbers will help you determine if your messages are having the effect you intended.
- Message deliverability: The effectiveness of your campaign’s text messages depends on message deliverability – if your messages are blocked as spam, you definitely will not persuade voters towards your cause. To avoid spam blocking, don’t include links in your first message. Instead, ask the voter a question that requires a response, such as “Voter registration ends on Oct. 12. Have you already registered?”. If the voter indicates that they have not, then send them the link to do so. Texting professionals have found that this approach actually increases the number of voters registered from this text, compared to sending out the link in the first message.
- Write your message to drive engagement: The best practices for high response and engagement rates are to keep your first message under 275 characters, don’t include links, and avoid sending multiple short messages at once. Messages along the lines of “Reply 1 for more information” typically have the highest engagement rates. Finally, test your messages before deploying to the full audience! Conduct same day testing on the message length, image usage, and your content to get the best results.
Access the full recording to hear additional tips from our panelists.