Flyers Versus Phone Banking And Neighborhood Canvassing: Alternatives And Best Practices For Minimizing Your Outreach Footprint
Thanks to the many minds at the Progressive Exchange for this list.
- Useful paper: advertise your event somewhere on the flyer, but make the rest of it reusable (for your purposes, maybe a recycling guide that can be hanged and the fridge).
- Consider having a small giveaway at the event for those that bring the flyer with them - that way, you can increase turnout and make sure that at least some of your flyers are properly recycled.
- In my experience, door to door canvassing only is effective if you leave the person with something — like a flyer. 99% of the time, they will forget everything you discussed the second they leave your presence, unless they walk away with something tangible to remind them
- I did community organizing work for years, and certainly learned some lessons. Having a conversation while handing out a flyer is good. Getting a “Yes, I’ll be there commitment,” is better. Following that up with a reminder phone call? Now, that’s a turn-out strategy. The actual metrics we used in field organizing were that 1 person might show up for every 1,000 flyers put on doors.
- Using phone banks, door-door, and using as little print as possible not only helps with the budget and footprint costs, but it also reinforces your commitment with new or potential supporters (even saying it to folks in the ask). I would only leave packs with people who seem truly committed, small or quarter pages with others (using soy-based ink and post-conumer paper).
- Don’t forget the small e-mail lists. In my [small] town there are: education lists (we have one that supports public education; the list run by the schools may or may not share), mommy listserv, school sports lists, political committee lists, retailer lists, club lists
- Ink stamps: get people to take a stamp, and they’ll be looking at it all day until it washes off — no trace.