63 Magazine - Issue 1

A presidential campaign will generate
literally billions of data points. Because
of the huge amount of data, the analytics
department needs to:
1) Prioritize which data and analytics
projects are most likely to deliver highest
return on investment (ROI). ROI on a
political campaign is the votes per dollar per
person and hour.
2) Conduct that analysis of the projects’
ROI accurately and quickly at lowest cost.
3) Communicate the results of that
analysis in a way that makes sense to
decision-makers.
4) Translate analysis into
recommendations that are reasonable and
can be implemented.
5) Measure results.
When Andrew worked in the analytics
department for President Obama’s
reelection campaign, they viewed
themselves as an internal consulting
group. “We met with every campaign
department – paid media, fundraising, field,
communications, operations, political. We
asked them: What do you know already?
What don’t you know that you need to know
in order to do your job better? What can we
give you that will help?”
“Then we figured out how we could
give each department the tools they
needed. Creating the best tools was an
iterative process, but by the end of the
campaign, we were able to support every
department in the most effective way.”
What parts of the work of an analytics
department are most
relevant to organizers?
1) Vote goals: Analysts help determine
vote goals. What is our baseline? How do
we get to victory using voter registration,
persuasion and GOTV?
2) Modeling: Analytics teams create
models to help decide which voters you
target for voter registration, persuasion, and
GOTV.
3) Mapping: Okay, so now that you
know who your targets are, where are they?
Analytics teams map your targets and help
assign turf to reach them.
4) Resource Allocation: How many
field organizers, volunteer leaders, and
volunteers does this campaign need? How
do we assign them?
5) Campaign Techniques: Data
and analytics help determine which
campaign techniques are most effective
for registration, persuasion, and GOTV.
Spoiler alert: it’s almost never yard signs.
How does an organizer’s work affect an
analytics department’s work?
Your work as an organizer affects an
analytics department’s work in two main
ways: execution and data.
1) Execution: Nothing the analytics
department does matters unless the
volunteers and organizers in the field use it.
Andrew describes it this way: