Canvassing strategies for a hybrid world
Is in-person canvassing still the gold standard for campaigners?
At least once in the past week, I’m sure you’ve tried to organise a social event or a work meeting and asked: are we doing it in person, or should we still be online? Shall we meet in the park, or at a restaurant, or stick to Zoom? You’ve read the guidelines and the studies, you may find yourself wearing a mask despite the lifting of restrictions, and you're probably still wondering if you’re doing the wrong or right thing.
You’re not alone.
We’re going to be asking ourselves about the best and safest ways to transition back to regular life for quite a while yet. And just as we’ve been trying to make smart decisions in our personal lives, I’ve been thinking about how campaigns are going to have to continue to be flexible and responsive to the needs of their volunteers and the general public. Specifically, I’ve been questioning the feasibility of in-person canvassing. Is it too early or worth the risk to volunteers? Is it still as effective in 2021 as in 2011? Can we split the difference and combine it with other canvassing methods? What does the research say?
Meeting people where they are… literally
When I worked for the UK Conservative Party, we tended to act on the common belief that face-to-face interventions were the most effective. We targeted every door-knock, trying to canvass the public so we could later on target the right people in marginal seats to cast those all-important votes.
That’s a common strategy in the United States, too, where door-to-door canvassing has long been part of the bread and butter of politics. I've certainly seen how this was drilled into field campaigners, especially those working on President Obama’s initial election and re-election campaigns. Similarly, avid readers of Alan Gerber and Donald Green’s earlier work (including myself) have supported this notion. But it takes serious time and people to get the results - and we also now know that normal canvassing doesn’t return the same results in every constituency, or every country. In fact, research by Joshua Townsley from 2017 suggests that partisan canvassing in the UK is less effective than leafleting. It may even have the unintended effect of mobilising opposition voters instead.
As new research emerges and people’s way of life change, campaigns and candidates must adopt. During the 2020 election cycle in the US, there was a lot of industry-wide coverage of high-impact, ultra-personal methods like deep canvassing that have driven incredible change across vast political differences. While the research suggests it's much more effective than traditional canvassing, I struggle to see how realistic it is to do at scale for the majority of campaigns who don’t invest in serious, long-term movement building.
I remember listening to members of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s 2018 campaign discuss some of the challenges with door-to-door canvassing in New York City. People were working at all hours and living in high-density areas like apartment buildings. It was a coin toss as to whether the canvassers would be able to find people at home, or even still living in the same place. Volunteers were only available at times when many people were at work.
Start wide, and narrow down
Okay, so door-to-door canvassing is costly, time-consuming and maybe not as effective as we thought. Instead, why don’t we consider starting by engaging a wider spread of people in a less targeted way? AOC’s campaign solution to the problem was placing canvassers at high-traffic locations. They could talk to a much higher volume of people, even though they weren’t targeting potential voters in the same way. Five years ago, I would have adamantly challenged this idea but now I can’t dismiss that blanket canvassing can be a good tactic in high population density areas, at times of days when there’s lots of traffic.
We can try giving people the opportunity to self-canvas, offering them the chance to share their opinions with us on various issues. They might not be interested in every issue we present, but we can start a conversation and add a voter intent question to the script. People are often more responsive to friends and family, so this would also be a great opportunity to mobilise supporters to do some small-scale canvassing in their social circles. Consider also homing in on specific segments of interest by meeting them on their platforms of choice and asking them to complete issue-based surveys.
Make it fun, make it easy
We can still reach out to canvass in interactive ways, even if we can’t show up on people’s doorsteps. Interactive tools and media can engage people in a way that feels easy and novel. Ahead of the 2015 General Election, the Conservative Party developed an online tax calculator that people could use to see how much money they could save. By offering them a useful tool, we engaged and connected with them in a way that was reciprocal. Instead of just firing questions at someone via email or social media, offer a way for them to receive feedback, learn something, or share results with their network. Use the strengths of face-to-face canvassing in a virtual setting: let people express opinions, ask questions, see you responding with interest to the things they care about. Tying in a voter intent question helps you connect the information you need about potential voters with their contact information. As always, be transparent and ask for consent.
Use your data wisely
I’m going to assume you’re a smart and organised campaigner and you’ve already collected the required consent to talk to your supporters through email and text. So why not use these avenues for canvassing? For people who are already connected to you, a quick email or text question could return you exactly the information you need, for a fraction of the time and effort of face-to-face canvassing. Combined with some personalised engagement by segment, and you’ve got a canvassing method that is low-friction and practical for your campaign, but doesn’t feel perfunctory or mass-produced to supporters.
And, think more broadly about aggregate data sources that you have access to. What geographical areas are you prioritising your limited resources for face-to-face canvassing? What information do you already have about canvassing in that area? What are your target subpopulations? Where are your swing voters? The answers to these questions will inform where you decide to narrow down from those broad canvassing strategies to your higher-cost, higher-impact face-to-face options.
Treat a hybrid approach as an opportunity, not a problem
In canvassing as in life right now, thinking really critically about trade-offs and limitations is vital. For the overexcited volunteers out there, I am not suggesting you don’t ever have to canvass someone in person again. Rather, I'm proposing that as campaigners we have a great opportunity to challenge our assumptions about what works, test some hybrid strategies based on the latest research, and work within the comfort zones of our volunteers and supporters. As I’ve said on the blog before, I advise leaning into the uncertainty and using it to drive flexibility and growth in your campaign.