Chris Emailed Me!

My wife Elizabeth actually reads Chris Dodd's emails. Against her will, she gets excited about them. (As someone who's worked as a professional political email writer, I am, unfortunately, completely immune.)

I've argued before that email is a medium suited, better than any other save a face to face meeting, to fostering a real personal connection. And Dodd's emails--thanks to Internet director Tim Tigaris and his team (and of course Chris Dodd himself!)--have done better than most at achieving that.

But today Dodd broke the political email sound barrier. He did something that--as far as I know--no other major candidate has ever attempted: a short email, dashed off just like one he'd write to a real friend, that gets right to the point and is totally real. It contains exactly 0% policy babble or high rhetoric--two things that people who are your supporters really don't need, and grow tiered of very quickly.

Reply-To: Chris_Dodd@chrisdodd.com

Subject: Real quick

Date: Thu, 27 Sep 2007 10:38:41 -0400 (EDT)

Hey,

I only have a few seconds on my way back to Washington from last night's

debate.

The fundraising quarter is wrapping up and we're just short of hitting our

goal. Will you chip in $23 and put us over the top? You can contribute

here:

http://www.chrisdodd.com/deadline

I'll be in touch soon.

If you haven't worked in a campaign and had to deal with the requirements and restrictions of policy and communications staffers, you might have a hard time understanding why I'm so impressed.

Campaigns these days are about everything BUT candidates forging a truly honest connection with their supporters. Most comms and policy staffers are terrified by that kind of honesty. In this age of polling and microtargetting, it's all about reaching swing voters. On the Kerry campaign, for example, someone would have first made us add "And together, we can build a stronger America!" And then a stem cell policy statement would have be jammed in there too.

That email from Dodd is a wonderful way to signal the start of a new kind of truly sincere conversation between candidate and supporter. (I like to imagine that this email was actually dashed off by Dodd himself after Tim Tigaris had somehow snuck onto the bus and made an impassioned plea to the Senator to just begin writing to his supporters as he would to any friend or colleague. --Disclaimer for Tim's sake: I've only met him a couple of times at conferences and I haven't spoken to him in at least 6 months, so don't let this get him in trouble!)

Now, Senator Dodd--or "Chris," as Elizabeth knows him--has to follow that email up ("I'll be in touch soon...").

So, "Chris," if I can offer a few words of free and impartial Internet consulting: be true to your supporters and keep up this conversation. Listen to Tim and don't let the policy and comms folks (as good as they are at *their* jobs) muddle up the raw clarity of your own voice speaking to your own supporters, who only you know so well.
___

PS: Please help Huffington Post's Off the Bus project monitor candidates' emails to supporters. Campaigns often send many different versions of emails to different parts of the country and to different profiles of supporters and voters. Please click here to get involved.