Political

Campaign Corner: How do we get more leaflet deliverers?

The Campaign Corner series looks to give three tips about commonly asked campaign issues. Do get in touch if you have any questions you would like to suggest.

Today’s Campaign Corner question: We know that there is more campaigning than leafleting, but our big problem at the moment is a shortage of deliverers. How should we go about getting more?

  1. Don’t just ask members: Asking your existing members is an obvious place to start. However, some people prefer to give money than time, and so see their membership sub as their contribution. Similarly, some people prefer to give time (and may also feel that joining an organisations is too much of a commitment), so are willing to deliver but not join. In most places, the majority of the regular Focus deliverers are not members but instead helpers recruited by asking supporters.
  2. Ask in lots of ways: The easier and quicker the method of asking, the less effective it is. Going round in person door to door, calling on known supporters, is the most successful but also the most time consuming method. Sending a quick email to everyone is much quicker, but gets fewer positive responses. So start with the easy and move up to the more time consuming, refining the people you are asking at each step from email to letter to phone to doorstep. At each step, those who have responded to say ‘yes’ or ‘no’ can be excluded and the next step can concentrate on everyone else.
  3. Target gaps in your delivery network: Local campaigners with a well-established record of distributing interesting local newsletters have often found that a special targeted leaflet or batch of door knocking in a road or village where a deliverer has dropped out is a great way to fill the gap. “Please help keep our newsletter going in your road” can be a very powerful message.

Want to know more about local campaigning? Campaigning In Your Community by myself and Shaun Roberts should be right up your street. It’s available for only £4 from ALDC and you can read an extract for free here.

Previous Campaign Corners have included:

You can read them all here.

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