Case Study
How Taylor McGovern U’Sellis’s Campaign Expanded their Fundraising Horizon with Campaign Deputy
“One of my favorite things was the email message center – being able to see how much money I raised from whatever email I sent was amazing and quantified the value of that part of the platform… Yeah, I just, I really loved it. I logged into Campaign Deputy every day of the campaign.” – Candidate T. U’Sellis
How Taylor McGovern U'Sellis's campaign built a $30,000 movement
In the dynamic world of politics, the power of data cannot be overstated, and campaign software is a key ally in achieving success. Yet, for local political newcomers like Taylor McGovern U’Sellis, who made a bid for Louisville Metro District 8 in Kentucky, the financial investment required for such software can be daunting. This is precisely the gap that Campaign Deputy’s user-friendly and cost-effective tools aim to bridge, providing a practical solution for candidates like U’Sellis. This case study illustrates how U’Sellis utilized Campaign Deputy, an economical alternative, to overcome obstacles such as limited time, staff, and resources. With Campaign Deputy at their disposal, U’Sellis and her campaign team exceeded their fundraising expectations, maintaining high levels of supporter engagement and achieving a remarkable fundraising campaign, even though the primary was ultimately won by an incumbent.
Key Highlights
Peace of Mind
Despite lacking a dedicated Treasurer, U’Sellis’s campaign was still capable of filing their KREF reports accurately and on time.
Cost Savings
U’Sellis's campaign maximized fundraising efficiency without breaking the bank by using our budget-friendly software, avoiding complex contracts and surprise fees.
Impressive Performance
U’Sellis’s emails resonated with recipients, achieving an outstanding 49% average open rate and meeting campaign targets.
Challenges
- Limited Resources: Facing budget limitations, Taylor’s city council campaign turned to a volunteer-driven approach, maximizing every dollar raised. High-cost traditional digital marketing simply wasn’t an option for this resourceful campaign.
- Limited Experience: U’Sellis’s opponent, an incumbent with a history of successful fundraising, held a significant financial advantage over Taylor, a first-time candidate.
Solutions
- Launching with Campaign Deputy: Taylor, a recent graduate from the EMERGE Kentucky program, soon launched her campaign with Campaign Deputy. Campaign Deputy effectively allowed U’sellis to rapidly launch her city council campaign without inhibiting up-front costs or lengthy onboarding and training. Soon enough, U’sellis’s campaign was sending emails and accepting donations within days of opening an account.
- Utilization of Campaign Deputy: Our platform was used for U’Sellis’s email marketing campaigns, event planning, forms creation, donor management, fundraising database, filing of campaign finance disclosures with the KY Registery of Election Finance (KREF), and call time management. For U’Sellis, fundraising was important, but not her priority since she knew her opponent would outraise her. This made the other functions of our platform more important to her campaign. By utilizing the email, forms, and event tools, the platform was able to help her leverage her volunteers to action. The emails garnered a 49% open rate and our transparent email analytics were particularly helpful in guiding U’Sellis’s outreach goals. Additionally, since U’Sellis was relying solely on volunteers for assistance with her campaign, Campaign Deputy’s direct KREF filing services saved her precious time. Without Campaign Deputy, U’Sellis reported that she would have had to use four different digital platforms to achieve the same goals.
Implementation
- Contribution Tracking & Reporting: Campaign Deputy’s seamless ActBlue integration allowed this grassroots campaign to effectively track and report U’Sellis’s donations to the KY Registry of Election Finance (KREF) on schedule.
- Outreach: Campaign Deputy’s tools allowed U’Sellis’ campaign to target audiences and pull lists of donors for mailing, email, and call time campaigns all while tracking engagement to better tailor their outreach methods.
- Training and Transition: Campaign Deputy’s quick adoption process minimized training time. This seamless transition allowed the campaign to keep its outreach momentum going without relying on additional resources.
Results
- Increased Efficiency: U’Sellis’s campaign was able to maintain a high level of engagement with approximately 50 or more active contributors, achieving a 49% organic open rate for emails.
- Cost Savings: Campaign Deputy eliminated the need for expensive outsourced services like compliance, digital marketing, and data storage, resulting in significant cost savings. This integrated strategy also produced a considerable return on investment, with U’Sellis’s email program contributing around 15% of donations and the remainder being near exclusively online contributions tracked using Campaign Deputy.
- Time Redistribution: Hours saved on complex report filing and donor management was redirected towards more strategic tasks such as the campaign’s social media presence, direct voter contact, and canvassing, enhancing overall campaign productivity.
Conclusion
Financial constraints should not be a barrier to local campaigns. This case study exemplifies how Taylor McGovern-U’Sellis, a debutant candidate for Louisville Metro District 8 in Kentucky, harnessed the power of an economical campaign management tool, Campaign Deputy, to surmount resource limitations. Even when pitted against an incumbent in the Primary, U’Sellis managed to orchestrate a remarkable fundraising campaign and foster robust supporter engagement, courtesy of Campaign Deputy. This underscores the tool’s efficacy in empowering campaigns, irrespective of the final electoral outcome, thereby redefining what victory can look like for local political aspirants.
A Word from Our Client
My number one volunteer, she said, ‘I heard Campaign Deputy does the KREF report for you. So, you should sign up.’ That was a great idea, because I had no idea what I was doing, and that’s what sold me on it. To be honest with you, I thought to myself, this is worth the price because that report is gonna be so monstrous and it really did come in handy.
See how our other clients found success with Campaign Deputy
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