Campaign Strategy Essay

1) What are the goals of the campaign? 2) What questions need to be answered to reach those goals? This is a list of general campaign questions to help start your research process. These are not research questions. Each general campaign question should generate a list of more specific research questions. For example, â€Å"What is the issue/problem?† could lead to the question, â€Å"What is the history of lead poisoning in our community?† General questions to ask about a campaign: 1. What is the issue/problem? (Understand their arguments.) 2. What are the solutions or alternatives? (Develop our arguments.) 3. Who else is trying to change the problem, how effective are they, and what are their solutions? (Potential allies. Locate a niche. Avoid obstacles and duplication of effort.) 4. Who can implement those solutions? Who has the power? (The Targets) 5. What kind of campaign would it take to convince them? (Feasibility test.) A. How long would victory take? What are the time constraints? B. What are tactics and paths to a victory? C. What are the opportunities or obstacles? D. What has worked for other organizations on similar campaigns? 6. Who are the other players? A. Who would support change? (Allies) B. Who opposes change? (Opposition) C. Who could become allies/opposition, but are currently neutral? 7. Does our base have the power and resources to win this campaign? 8. Will this campaign build our movement, base, or organization? WHAT IS A CAMPAIGN STRATEGY? A campaign can be seen as an organised, purposeful effort to create change, and it should be guided by thoughtful planning. Before taking action, successful campaigners learn as much as possible about: * the existing situation * who is affected by the campaign issue both positively and negatively * what changes could improve the situation * what resources, tactics and tools are available to implement a campaign that will address the issue. Campaigners use this knowledge to create their strategy, which guides them in planning, implementing, marketing, monitoring, improving and evaluating their campaign. A campaign strategy should answer the †¨following questions: Problem, Vision, Change 1. What problem are you confronting? 2. What is your vision of how the world will be, once the problem is resolved? 3. What change/s would bring about this vision? Stakeholders, Relationships,Targets 4. Who is affected, positively or negatively, by the problem? 5. How are these people or groups related to the problem and to each other? 6. Who are you trying to reach? 7. If your campaign is successful, who will be affected? Answering key questions repeatedly, at each stage of your campaign, about the problem, solution, stakeholders and targets as well as the tactics, message and tools you will use, will help develop your campaign strategy. Your campaign strategy will guide what you do and it should be updated regularly as the campaign is implemented and the situation changes. CREATE A COMMON VISION It’s useful to involve your whole campaigning group in exploring the problem, your vision and the changes sought: a shared understanding of the problem will stimulate ideas about possible actions to take, and will also help your group to stay motivated and focussed during the campaign. Creating a common vision will also help determine ways to monitor, and adjust the implementation of, the campaign if necessary. Activity 1: PROBLEM – SOLUTION – CHANGE 1. Discuss and decide, as a group, what core problem your campaign seeks to address. Elaborate all the adverse effects of this problem. 2. Each person in the group should create their own answer to the following question: What would a world without this problem be like? * Use words, diagrams, illustrations. * Imagine unlimited resources (money, power, etc). * Discuss and enumerate all the benefits of this proposed world. 3. Combine your individual visions of the future to create a single common vision for the campaign. Discuss in depth which broad actions or changes would resolve the problem you identified, so as to arrive at the world you have envisioned. These necessary actions are the main focus of your campaign. Discuss the scope of your campaign: decide whether it has multiple components (sub-campaigns). If it does, you may choose either to narrow the focus of your campaign or create a multiple-campaign strategy. UNDERSTAND THE CAMPAIGN’S STAKEHOLDERS Stakeholders are people, groups, organisations, or institutions that are connected to your issue. They may support your campaign, be adversely affected by the issue in question, have the power to change the situation, or even be responsible for the problem you have identified. An important task when designing your campaign is to learn as much about the stakeholders as possible. You should: * Understand each stakeholder’s relationship to the problem and your proposed solution * Define the relationships between different stakeholders * Determine the ability and willingness of stakeholders to help or hurt your campaign * Identify which of these stakeholders your campaign should concentrate on to create the change your desire. Activity 2: MAPPING STAKEHOLDERS AND THEIR RELATIONSHIPS Start creating a map in which entities with a stake in your issue are represented as circles, or nodes, and lines between these circles represent relationships. It is good to use sticky papers (post-it notes) for this activity because they can be moved about as required. 1. Discuss the interaction that is at the root of the problem your campaign wants to address. Who creates the problem? Who is affected by it? How and why are these entities connected to one another? 2. Continue, taking notes as you go along, until you can identify the interaction between entities (nodes) that most represents what you seek to change. 3. Identify all of the nodes between which this kind of interaction is happening. 4. Place these nodes at the center of your map. 5. Identify the relationships of these central nodes with others nodes on your map. Start locally and move outward regionally, nationally, internationally and globally, if relevant. Depending on your problem, expand your map with two or more levels of nodes (marking these in a clear way): * First level: entities with direct contact to the central nodes (family / local) * Second level: entities with contact to the first level (regional / national) * Third level: nodes with general influence on the issue (international / institutional) 6. Next, draw lines representing relationships between these nodes and identify the kind of relationship they have; for example: * Power * Mutual benefit * Conflict * Potential After mapping out as many stakeholders as you can, you will have a graphic representation of your stakeholders’ relationships with your issue. Next you should analyse how your stakeholders may help achieve the change/s you seek. For more information on how to do this, see New Tactics in Human Rights Tactical Mapping. Activity 3: FROM STAKEHOLDERS TO TARGETS Begin defining specific objective/s of your campaign. Consider each stakeholder’s level of support and level of influence in the context of your campaign objective/s. 1. In simple, active terms, define what would resolve your problem and bring about the change you seek. Your objectives should be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and time-bound. 2. Using the list of the stakeholders from the previous activity, identify as many as possible who could help achieve your objective. 3. Draw a horizontal and a vertical axis on a large sheet of blank paper (shown here). Place the stakeholders as follows: * The vertical axis represents their level of influence in achieving the goal of your objective from most influential (top) to least influential (bottom). * The horizontal axis represents whether they are likely to oppose (left) or support (right) your campaign. 4. After you place all the stakeholders on the paper, identify the most influential entities or individuals as potential primary targets, those who can make the change you seek. Note their level of support or opposition for this change. 5. Discuss the relationship of these entities to other stakeholders. You may already have this information on your stakeholder map from Activity 2. 6. Identify stakeholders who support your campaign and have influence on or relationships with your primary target group. They are your secondary targets, or participant groups, who could become actively involved in helping your campaign achieve its goals. Locate them on your graph and identify two or three participant groups to concentrate on. (Adapted from The Change Agency’s Power Mapping exercise.) Activity 4: FROM TARGETS TO TACTICS Now you have identified the target audiences that your campaign needs to communicate with, and what relationships they have with other entities with a stake in the problem, you can consider what tactics will best address your target and participant groups? 1. Draw a half-circle, divided into wedges. Place those who most support your campaign on the left side of the spectrum; those who oppose you the most on the right. 2. Use your maps and sticky papers, placing each target and stakeholder in a wedge according to their level of support for your cause. The result is a spectrum of stakeholders, a few of whom you have identified as primary or secondary targets. A five-wedge diagram would include the following: a. Active allies: supportive and motivated to achieve your goals b. Allies: may benefit from your success c. Neutral parties: may not be involved or affected currently d. Opponents: may suffer from your success e. Active opponents: actively interfere with your activities 3. Use this diagram to help decide which tactics to consider, depending on each stakeholder’s location on the spectrum. For example: f. Supportive: use mobilisation tactics g. Neutral: use educational. visualisation tactics h. Opposing: use disruption, interference tactics (Adapted from New Tactics in Human Rights’ Spectrum of Allies exercise.) This card was created by Namita Singh and Ali Gharavi in collaboration with Tactical Tech. There are four essential elements to every successful capital campaign: the Case; Leadership; Prospects; and, the Plan. This article is last in a series addressing each element and will focus on designing a successful capital campaign plan. You cannot do everything at once, but you can do one thing at a time. Begin by designing a comprehensive campaign strategy that works well you and your organization. Every successful campaign begins with a plan. The campaign plan is a detailed set of procedural guidelines for campaign leaders and volunteers. The successful campaign plan is built with two overriding principles in mind: (1) Anything other than a complete success is entirely unacceptable; and (2) To ensure the complete success of this fundraising effort, the campaign must be formally declared (and treated) as the primary institutional priority of the organization throughout the fundraising timetable. Recognizing and stating these basic truths puts you into the mindset to make the dec isions and commitments necessary for a successful campaign. From there, we begin to incorporate essential fundraising elements into a comprehensive strategy. Just as there are the four essential elements of a successful campaign (Case, Leadership, Prospects and Plan) there are many vital techniques at work within a good fundraising plan, among them the use of: personal visits, a phased approach, specific gift requests, lead and major gift solicitation, pledge type gifts. Personal visits always yield more money. People give to people—people they love, people they admire, people they respect and even people they fear. Often it is the personal relationship of the volunteer making the request that has the most sway with the potential donor. Our classic technique demands that we employ a phase-by-phase approach to our fundraising, always asking for the largest gifts first, and then medium sized gifts and finally smaller gifts. This ensures that we create enthusiasm and build momentum. Our success, as evidenced by our rapidly rising fundrais ing totals and our large average gift, will pull undecided people toward us and encourage them to give. Victory has a thousand fathers, yet defeat is always an orphan. One of the most important concepts we must use is to ask for a specific gift. We should be asking mostly with a view of our need in mind, but with some view of their means in mind as well. As we articulate the request, we want to make it clear that the reason we are asking them for this specific amount is because we need it if we are to succeed. It is important that they not get the sense that we are asking them for this amount just because we think they have it, or because we think that is what they â€Å"ought to give,† but only because â€Å"we have this enormous need and a limited number of people of means to whom we can turn.† If people are going to help you achieve ambitious plans, they need to know what is required of them. You must always ask for the specific gift. Every campaign that is successful in reaching its potential is going to do a good job of soliciting Leadership and Major Gifts. Clearly some families are especially able to help because of their material blessings. Within the fundraising industry, it is a well-known fact that approximately 80% of the money (or more) will come from just 20% of the people (and sometimes fewer). These Leadership and Major Gifts set the pace for others to follow and they provide the financial foundation upon which to build a successful campaign. Much time is spent, early in the campaign, trying to determine who should be challenged to consider a gift of this significant nature. A well-run campaign will always stress equal effort, equal stretching or even equal sacrifice from every prospective donor, but not equal giving. Each prospect should be encouraged to do their individual best. Another element of a successful campaign plan is to offer people the opportunity to make pledges, rather than one-time gifts, and to offer longer pledge redemption periods where appropriate and possible. Depending upon the length of the pledge redemption period, pledges are usually two—three times larger than one-time contributions. In today’s busy world, people often budget their money very carefully. If a family were going to give you $100 per month, you would rather have that run for 60 months (5 years) than 36 months (3 years), would you not? Narrowing the pledge collection period is not going to get this family (which is giving out of current income) to pay the money any sooner. It will merely get you a smaller pledge. There are many other important aspects of a solid fundraising plan, including: Financial Goals and Objectives Clearly stated goals tied to both the leaders responsible for attaining them and the timeline over which they are to be accomplished. A Detailed Campaign Timetable Giving form to function, the timetable gives us an orderly way to approach a complex task, ensuring the most important things are going to be done first. Organizational Chart Clarifying the responsibilities of each campaign leader and showing everyone how they are related to one another. Description of Leadership Roles and Responsibilities Written instructions delineating the job responsibilities of each leader/volunteer. Campaign Phases and/or Divisions and Tracks of Activity Another form of timeline, breaking out major phases of activity and tracks of action. Many phases may go on simultaneously, while others will be the only activity underway at that given time. Lead and Major Gift Programs This most important track of activity begins during the early quiet phase of the campaign and continues until the potential for such gifts has been exhausted. Commemorative Gift Plan A comprehensive plan to commemorate the gifts of your campaign donors, especially major and leadership donors which might include naming opportunities, public recognition and memorabilia that you can give to outstanding leaders/donors (such as a scale model of a building, etc.). Keep in mind that the plan may evolve as the campaign moves forward. Often this is a function of actual early results, and who is giving at what levels. Who is accepting a leadership role? Preparing a detailed timetable and organizational chart is a good way of measuring the progress of the campaign in relation to the plan and detecting when necessary adjustments or revisions may be needed. It also provides a specific measure of accountability. Establish goals for each constituency and phase. Everyone needs to know what is expected of him or her! A statistical summary of the number and level of gifts required to reach the campaign goal for each phase of activity should be kept regularly. This list should be constantly monitored against progress to date and should be consulted daily to develop a precise order of solicitation, thus providing us a plan and timetable for asking. In summary, the campaign plan is one of the four essential elements of a successful capital campaign and must be carefully researched and crafted. Remember to keep a close eye on the fundraising plan and modify it in view of your actual experiences. The plan is your road map to success. Remember, it is static while the world is very dynamic. Use the plan as your basic guide, maintaining your liberty to deviate from it briefly where called upon, and you will find it serves you quite nicely and leads to your fundraising success.