Our 2020 Election Year Review

The 2020 election year was like no other. A global pandemic, economic problems, and widespread misinformation caused enormous upheaval in our daily life. It changed how we use the Internet for communication, shopping and education.

It also accelerated the convergence of politics and technology.

Every few years brings a watershed turning point to online campaigning. It began with campaign websites back the 1990s. Then online fundraising caught on in the mid 2000s. This was followed by the rise of social media, leading to the hyper-targeted advertising of today. Presidential campaigns would break in online innovations, but that technology would quickly spread to state and local campaigns.

That was the case until 2020. Then, by midyear, everyone changed how they did things, almost all at once.

To highlight some of the online changes and challenges candidates faced this year, we’ve put together a summary of the 2020 election cycle.

These observations are based on our experiences working with our clients. Most of them were local and state candidates.

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The pandemic changed everything

In the spring, when the pandemic began to take hold in the Northeast, we warned our newsletter readers that change was coming. Traditional political campaigning was going to give way to online campaigning.

And it did.

First, localized shutdowns and social distancing protocols prevented field operations like door knocking and canvassing. Later, with much of the country under quarantine, candidates were stuck. They were unable to hold in-person events or meet voters face to face.

Campaigns that were about to kick off their fundraising efforts had to make alternate plans. Candidates running primaries also found their campaigning activity curtailed.

But adaption came fast.

Campaigning goes virtual

The old fundraising playbook wouldn’t work in a time of social distancing, health concerns and a deteriorating economy. It was hard to convince someone who may have lost their job to donate (though political contributions would later rebound by summer).

Many candidates adjusted by moving their campaigns almost entirely online. In doing so, the pandemic itself provided a topic for conversation. On social media, candidates shared personal stories and stories about others who needed help. They could talk about volunteers and organizations that were making a difference. They could highlight and share important safety news.

It was a matter of taking a bad situation to build meaningful engagement with voters.

As campaign staffers were forced to work remotely, field organizing shifted to texting and phone banking. Digital campaigning and advertising replaced door-to-door canvassing.

We found clients started relying more on email and texting. Online organizational tools grew in use.

[bctt tweet=”With only limited traditional campaigning methods available in 2020, candidates were forced to venture into the digital realm.” username=”onlinecandidate”]

Some of our new clients were seasoned politicians who had never bothered with online campaigning. Some never needed to. Others were facing more tech-savvy opponents. With only limited traditional campaigning methods available, incumbents were also forced to adapt online outreach methods.

But perhaps the biggest game-changer this year was video.

With many voters stuck at home, virtual events became extremely popular. Face-to-face meetings were replaced with online Zoom meetings. Donor and meet-the-candidate events were now held online. Some events were open, others for select audiences.

Video through services like Facebook Live became a very popular way for politicians to interact with the electorate. They were easy to set up, often requiring little than a mobile phone. They could be recorded live, then uploaded to Facebook for replay.

With a little planning, online events could have as much going on as in-person events:

• Special guests could attend remotely.
• Interviews could be conducted.
• Questions could be answered. They could be previously submitted or directly asked from the viewing audience.
• Online donations could be solicited.

Did these virtual events work as well as in-person events? That would depend on the skill of the organizers and how well they were able to promote their events through email, texting and social media.

One thing is certain: Online events are not going away. They cost little to organize and are easier than ever to produce.

Online advertising falls under scrutiny

In late 2019, Twitter stopped accepting political ads, though it remained a major platform for political speech. In 2020, the platform would take the additional step of labeling some tweets that it deemed promoting false and misleading information. From just October 27 to November 11, Twitter labeled some 300k tweets as misleading.

Facebook enhanced its’ verification process for running political ads on Facebook and Instagram. Advertising included targeted image or video ads or even just boosting a post. These restrictions applied not only to ads advocating for a particular candidate, but also sensitive ‘social issues’ like civil and social rights, the environment and immigration.

Google also required verification and placed restrictions on its advertising platforms, including YouTube. Election ads audience targeting was limited to age, gender, and general location.

To round things out, Pinterest, Twitch, and TikTok also prohibited political advertising.

You could still advertise online in 2020, but things were a bit more difficult. The wild west days of advertising to anyone, anywhere, had been curbed after the 2016 US presidential election. To run online ads in 2020 required transparency and verification of who, exactly, was purchasing political ads.

In addition to enhanced authorization processes, Facebook, Twitter and Google all maintained public ad archives. These archives store information about politically-geared ads, who purchased them, how much was spent, and targeting data. Smart campaigns took advantage of this transparency to keep an eye on the opposition.

Huge Facebook frustrations

A number of campaigns reached out to us this year because they had problems getting authorized to run their political ads on Facebook. It was a frustrating process, and Facebook did not provide much in the way of support.

Problems during the authorization process included:

• The need for some people to submit documentation multiple times.
• Being required to submit additional information after submission.
• A wait time for approval that took weeks – or longer.
• Never hearing back on their status at all.

Unfortunately, we could not do much to help with these problems. At one point, we sent an email warning our readers about what was happening and that they should start the authorization process early and follow the current instructions to the letter.

That one email generated more feedback than anything we had ever published. We heard a lot of complaints about the onerous process.

Some campaigns tried to run to run political ads through Facebook before they are authorized. That led to automatic flagging and rejection. It’s possible that repeated attempts led to some campaigns being permanently banned from advertising. Feedback suggests these bans happened to at least a few campaigns.

[bctt tweet=”Facebook’s advertising ban a week before Election Day left some organizations scrambling because they had either waited too long to get authorized or had not submitted their ads in time.” username=”onlinecandidate”]

Another problem that local candidates faced was Facebook’s advertising ban a week before Election Day. This left some organizations scrambling because they had either waited too long to get authorized or had not submitted their ads before the deadline.

In the end, a lot of organizations that wanted to buy advertising were not able to. It’s apparent that Facebook left a lot of money on the table.

IP targeting strikes the mark

One area that experienced growth was IP Targeting. Basically, IP targeting is where a list of physical addresses are converted to corresponding IP addresses. From there, advertiser display ads appear on all devices at the location – home computers, tablets, cell phones – that someone uses to surf the web. The banner ads show on news sites, email portals and other popular websites.

Of course, disclosure information must be supplied to run IP ads, but it’s nowhere as imposing as Facebook and Google’s authorization requirements.

We saw a huge uptick in our IP targeting marketing service this year. We ran many IP ad campaigns ahead of primary elections and for various get out the vote efforts. Some campaigns ran IP ads in November because they ran into Facebook’s time constraints for targeted advertising.

We encouraged our advertisers to cull down their address lists to those they wanted to reach most. It was better to target a more focused list with more display ads than a larger list with fewer ads.

A few candidates told us that while social distance canvassing, some voters actually recognized them from their online ads. Branding works!

The aftermath: Did digital live up to the hype?

So how did all this work out? Did digital campaigning fully take up the slack of missing in-person campaigning?

Candidates who could not or would not campaign online in 2020 probably suffered – particularly if their opponents aggressively pursued a digital strategy.

There are indications that digital-only might have hurt some campaigns, particularly on a congressional level. While Joe Biden won the US presidential election, this success did not translate into a massive sweep of victory for Democrats in down-ballot races.

Would more in-person canvassing and social-distanced in-person events have made the difference? Was online ads, social media and email efforts not enough to connect with voters? That’s something to be examined in the months to come.

Regardless, online engagement was essential for voter outreach. For those who embraced change this year, a strong digital presence helped make a difference. A website, social media, text, video and online advertising helped brand and promote candidates to a home-bound electorate.

2020 was another watershed turning point for online campaigning. There is no going back.

Even when ‘traditional campaigning’ makes its eventual return, politics and tech will continue to evolve from here.

Shane Daley is a partner and developer of OnlineCandidate.com. With over 15 years experience in web marketing and online political campaigning, Shane is the author of the book ‘Running for Office as an Online Candidate‘. You can connect with him on LinkedIn.