Yes We Did: Reelecting Obama.

Presentation by Josh Higgins (Former Creative Director at Obama for America) and Daniel Ryan (Former Director of Front-end Development for Obama for America) on how design and development collaborated to help win the 2012 election.

Transcript

1. YES WE DID Reelecting Obama. The longest 15 months of our lives. Holy shit.
2. WHO WE ARE Josh Higgins Creative Director Daniel Ryan Director of Front-end Development • Previously a freelance developer • Started developing in 1998 • Advisor to 48 Hour Launch • Mentor at Create-a-thon on Campus • Advertising & Branding Chair for YPAC • Thirteen years in the industry • AIGA San Diego Board of Directors • Founder of The Haiti Poster Project, and the So-Cal Poster Project • Founder of Phonography
3. BUILDING THE TEAM 53 People 1 Family
4. BUILDING THE CULTURE Respect. Empower. Include. Win.
5. BUILDING THE PROCESS • Creative projects aren’t built on an assembly line • Collaboration from conception to launch • Constant communication and feedback • Define “success” from the beginning
6. CASE STUDY: ACA TOOL The challenge: Represent the benefits of Obamacare to every household 600 different user input combinations resulting in 2 dozen possible outcome Collaborate with project managers, designers, developers, policy experts, press staff, researchers and senior staff Make it responsive and embeddable on any website
7. CASE STUDY: ACA TOOL
8. CASE STUDY: ACA TOOL
9. CASE STUDY: ACA TOOL
10. CASE STUDY: ACA TOOL
11. A CAMPAIGN DOES THREE THINGS •Fundraise •Persuade potential voters •Get voters to the polls
12. FUNDRAISING: DATA DRIVEN “We are going to measure every single thing in this campaign” - Jim Messina, Campaign Manager
13. FUNDRAISING: WHY WE WENT RESPONSIVE
14. FUNDRAISING: WHY WE WENT RESPONSIVE 0 5,000,000 10,000,000 15,000,000 20,000,000 25,000,000 30,000,000 Apr 2011 Jun 2011 Aug 2011 Oct 2011 Dec 2011 Feb 2012 Apr 2012 Jun 2012 Aug 2012 Oct 2012 Mobile traffic trippled over the course of the campaign Source: Google Analytics
15. FUNDRAISING: WHY WE WENT RESPONSIVE Source: Pew Research Center 17% 48% 35% Overall US Cell Phone Ownership Owns smartphone Owns feature phone Does not own cellphone
16. FUNDRAISING: WHY WE WENT RESPONSIVE Source: Pew Research Center 0 20 40 60 80 100 Affluent 18-24 Ethnic minority Demographic breakdown of smartphone owners
17. FUNDRAISING: WHY WE WENT RESPONSIVE Source: Pew Research Center 25% of all smartphone owners only access the Internet via their phone
18. FUNDRAISING: TESTING • Ask a question: Does the color of a button on a form affect conversion rates? • Pose a hypothesis: Positive colors like green or blue will positively affect conversion rates. • Do an experiment • Analyze the results: Any button color but red works.
19. FUNDRAISING: TESTING METHODOLOGIES • A/B or multivariant testing • Focus groups • User testing
20. FUNDRAISING: TESTING METHODOLOGIES • We generated over half a billion Google Analytics custom events • We ran almost 1,000 A/B tests to millions of visitors
21. FUNDRAISING: THE EVER-EVOLVING DONATE PAGE
22. FUNDRAISING: THE EVER-EVOLVING DONATE PAGE
23. FUNDRAISING: THE EVER-EVOLVING DONATE PAGE
24. $690,000,000 Raised Online
25. $690,000,000 Raised Online $125,000,000+ As A Result of Testing
26. FUNDRAISING: LOTS OF MERCH
27. PERSUASION: DESIGNING WITH EMOTION
28. PERSUASION: PHOTOGRAPHY STYLES
29. PERSUASION: SHARE GRAPHICS
30. PERSUASION: SHARE GRAPHICS
31. PERSUASION: LIFE OF JULIA
32. PERSUASION: LIFE OF JULIA
33. PERSUASION: LIFE OF JULIA
34. PERSUASION: TARGETED SHARING
35. PERSUASION: TARGETED SHARING
36. PERSUASION: BRAND CONSISTENCY
37. GOTTA REGISTER
38. GOTTA REGISTER
39. GOTTA REGISTER
40. GOTTA VOTE
41. GOTTA VOTE
42. GOTTA VOTE
43. GOTTA VOTE
44. GOTTA VOTE
45. GOTV: GET OUT THE VOTE
46. WHY WE DID IT
47. NO REALLY...
48. THANKS SO MUCH! Josh Higgins joshhiggins.com @josh_higgins Daniel Ryan dryan.com @dryan Slides at dryan.com/aiga2013