Winning a political campaign always come down to numbers. Turning those numbers into wins for Democratic and progressive campaigns is what Washington, D.C.-based NGP VAN is all about, as you can learn more in this week's Beat Podcast.
NGP VAN vice president of marketing and community Aharon Wasserman and community manager Kyle Tharp stopped by for a beer and to talk about how to turn data into winning election strategies. As is very evident by now, the power of data drives more and more of our society and economy. Politics is just another outlet for it. Data can improve fundraising, expand outreach and still make sure everything is compliant with the law.
"Most of the innovation and the things that we've been working on are based around getting away from just these giant buckets of people," Wasserman said. "And, instead, saying, OK based on these thousand data points, what is the individualized strategy we want to give to each individual person."
The data can create an ideal program for getting out votes, and with exclusive rights to the Democratic National Committee's voter file, NGP VAN is pretty much a requirement for a modern Democratic candidate. That role in the campaigns also helps it overcome the perennial hunger for talent that so many tech companies have. The prestige can overcome the lure of much higher salaries at bigger companies, Wasserman and Tharp said.
"Our VAN software is the central piece of software used by the Hillary Clinton campaign." Wasserman said. "That is a major selling point."
And it's more than just the behind-the-scenes tech that makes NGP VAN so valuable. NGP VAN went for a much more intuitive platform for volunteers and campaign staff to use during the campaign and on election day. More obvious toolkits, a better mobile app and faster feedback response all received heavy investment over the last year or so.
"The change has been substantial since 2012," Wasserman said. "We've seen just people freaking out on social media about how much they love it."
Listen to the whole interview and our look at this week's big news in D.C. Innovation on iTunes or on SoundCloud below.
