Situation
Montana reliably supports Republican candidates for President – and as Governor Steve Bullock mounted his re-election campaign, we designed a digital program to raise grassroots funds from Democrats, while also appealing to Trump voters.
Strategy
Focusing on Montana-specific issues like access to public lands, we used direct response advertisements to recruit supporters from across the state beginning in the fall of 2015, and waged an aggressive email campaign to convert those supporters into small donors. As the election approached in 2016, we focused on persuading and turning out key targets – voters with medium to highest modeled turnout scores and mid-range support scores, and high support scores with mid-ranged turnout scores.
Results
Governor Bullock won the race by 4 points or 18,000 votes, winning in a year where Donald Trump won the state by more than 20 points.
‘‘You can’t leave any votes on the table when you’re looking to re-elect a Democratic governor in a state Trump won by more than 20 points – and thanks to Rising Tide Interactive, we reached exactly the right voters for every objective the campaign needed to achieve online: donors to fund our efforts, Republicans who were open to Bullock’s message of delivering results, and GOTV targets that put us over the top”
Eric Hyers, Campaign Manager Steve Bullock for Governor
