Community Mapping With Your Political Campaign

When COVID-19 hit, many organizers found themselves caught off guard. Plans for in-person canvassing programs were suddenly scrapped to accommodate social distancing guidelines. To achieve maximum impact without door knocking, campaigns leveraged pre-existing personal relationships with individuals and institutions to get the word out about their candidate. After all, people are much more likely to act when the call comes from someone they already know. These tactics all fall under the umbrella of relational organizing, and begin with the process of community mapping. 

As we exit the pandemic era, relational organizing continues to be an important aspect of any Field campaign. But how do you initiate contact if you don’t yet have a strong base of connected community leaders?

While the process can seem overwhelming at first, your campaign likely already has a broad network in place just waiting to be mobilized. Here is how to use community mapping to connect with these voters.

Identify Who You Want to Reach

The first step in community mapping is identifying the key connectors in your community: Both people and institutions. Have each member of your team make a list of every key leader and institution in your community. After your list is ready, have a brainstorming session to see if you missed anyone.

When I fundraised for a congressional race, I focused on meeting lawyers, bankers, and accountants since they were more likely to know executives that had the means to support the campaign. And when I ran for local office, I focused on churches, after-school sports, and the PTA of every school in the area.

As you map your community, consider reaching out to the following: Schools (public, private, charter), civic groups (Rotary, Kiwanis, Lions), senior groups, youth sports, churches, current and former elected officials, environmental organizations, resistance groups, minority groups, labor unions, and advocacy organizations.

Community Mapping and Finding “Connectors”

Cold calling is frustrating, generally ineffective, and extremely time-consuming. The alternative is to find a connection that can make a warm introduction. The key is to figure out how your organization connects to your target list of community leaders/groups.

Who do you or your staffers know personally who knows the “connector?” The goal here is to flesh out your list of connectors with name, email addresses, phone numbers and information on how you are connected to the connector.

Training and Planning

Once you’ve built your target list of connectors, you’ll need to train your team to reach out to them. Write call scripts designed for community leaders instead of strangers. The tone of the conversation should be adjusted accordingly. Make sure the script includes an appropriate call-to-action. It could be an ask to volunteer, donate, or become a digital volunteer. Lastly, make sure the call ends with a request for names of other connected people in the community they will reach out to. Don’t forget to have the team practice calling each other—and then friendly supporters before scaling your program.

Time to Mobilize!

The last step is to start making calls! The goal here is to evangelize community leaders. Converting connectors to supporters of your cause will often be 100x more impactful than getting a stranger’s support. Accordingly, you should allocate more time per call. Getting the right community member excited is significantly more important than the quantity of calls you make.

Once you have developed your plan, make sure to leverage technology to streamline and scale your efforts. As you ramp your program, adjust and adapt based on your successes and failures. For example, you may find that a certain team member excels at reaching out to a certain segment of your community, or that texting before calling yields better results.

While community mapping takes work, if you start early and are diligent, you will find it will ultimately save you an immense amount of time and will produce amazing results. I expect that even after the coronavirus is a distant memory, community mapping will be an important tool in your arsenal!

Learn More About Community Mapping!

NDTC’s course, “Relational Organizing 101,” will illustrate how community mapping and relational organizing can boost your Field campaign. You’ll learn how to design and manage an effective relational organizing program, and prepare supporters to mobilize their networks.

Take the Course