Leveraging our way to better fundraising

For the past several decades the GOP has generally enjoyed supremacy over Democrats in terms of fundraising, especially when it comes to the mass support of small donors. This is a direct result of conservative development and mastery of new techniques that began in the 1970's, specifically, direct mail fundraising. For decades, Republicans have used better direct mail fundraising efforts to cultivate millions of small donors to help overcome the Democrats' edge among large contributors and their support among trade unions. We enjoyed that advantage because we mastered the technology of the times. But now, the technology is changing (at warp speed) and we're in danger of being left behind.

For the first time in decades, the Democrat's presidential campaigns (and soon the Democrat Party) are outpacing us in small donor support and cultivation. And they're doing it because they're moving faster and making a greater commitment to master new technology and integrate it into their operations. Look no further than Barack Obama's campaign (over fifty-fivemillion in one month!). The closest example on our side has been Ron Paul's campaign.

Time to make changes:

There's no reason why we can't move ahead with making the same type of technology available to state and local party organizations (and grassroots supporters) to create their own fundraising campaigns online. By that, I don't mean simply a "donate here" link, but the kind of internet community building platform that allows for (and encourages) personalized fundraising campaigns on behalf of the candidate or party in question by motivated, self-organizing supporters.

This type of fundraising focus acknowledges that there are only so many donors out there who will max out, but there is (by comparison) an unlimited amount of $10 and $20 dollar credit card donations waiting to be motivated.

Leverage our resources:

Another major problem is the "balkanization" of our resources. Under our current setup, there's little or no incentive for organizations at the various levels in our party to share and coordinate the use of resources with one another. Specifically, donor lists and information. All our donor information would be much more valuable to the party at all levels if it were pooled together and leveraged. What good does it do a local Republican Party if there are donors to the Republican National Committee in that county that they aren't aware of (and vice versa)? Why not enter into joint fundraising operations and reduce the need or desire to hoard names at each level of our party?

Our goal should be to move to a more integrated structure. One where each level of our party contributes to the success of the other, and gains from cooperation with the others.

Our party has tremendous resources and solid volunteer and grassroots support. But we're falling behind in the battle to get the most out of those resources because we're not leveraging them.

By not doing so, we're the military equivalent of an army going into battle with the strategy and tactics from the last war. And the enemy has updated theirs for the next war. We've got to modernize our resources, our tactics and strategies to not just be competitive, but to be superior and to win. Otherwise, what's the point?