Relentless Engages Key Georgia Voters with Relational Organizing

Background

Relentless is a political organizing company with a focus on scaled relational mobilization. Rally, Relentless’ flagship product, is a relational network that empowers campaigns, advocacy organizations, and individuals to reach, persuade, and activate their communities on Election Day — and beyond.

Relational organizing is the idea that when it comes to organizing, people talking to their friends and family is more effective than strangers talking to strangers. In an age when trust in institutions is low, the messenger is as important as the message.

Rally is supercharging relational outreach, giving campaigns, and volunteers across the country with a framework for mobilizing their communities to have meaningful conversations, get out the vote, and so much more.

Challenge

In late 2022, Relentless sought to increase Democratic turnout through community and use relational organizing during the runoff election for U.S. Senate in Georgia. The election was incredibly important for the people of Georgia and the nation. At the time of the runoff, re-electing Sen. Raphael Warnock to the Senate would ensure a two-seat majority for Democrats for at least two years and help provide flexibility for legislation and judicial nominees. 

In Georgia, Relentless focused on outreach to young voters of color and working class voters for relational organizing. This group of voters is often difficult to mobilize with traditional forms of political outreach. Plus, a runoff election only a few weeks after the 2022 midterms could easily slip past most potential voters. 

Solution

In order to meet their goals in Georgia, Relentless utilized Source, Civitech’s voter file, to find and target low propensity voters. 

Source is a national voter file that includes registered voter data in every state. The data contains accurate and up-to-date information on voting behavior, contact information and partisan propensity scores. 

Source made it possible for the organization to know who exactly it was reaching, to ensure the program was hitting its goals on an ongoing basis, and to measure the final results. 

Programs

Finding real voters and encouraging them to have political conversations with loved ones was key for Relentless to drive change in Georgia. The organization hired community ambassadors who utilized their personal relationships to get people engaged in the civic process.

Source data made it easy for Relentless ambassadors to confirm if voters were already registered and had turned out in previous elections.

The quality of the Source data meant ambassadors stayed engaged in their programs instead of wasting time sorting through poor data, which improved the quality of the interactions and increased the number of contacts ambassadors could make.

Results

In total, the 1,481 community ambassadors encouraged 67,600 folks to vote for Sen. Warnock, across 96% of counties and 94% of precincts in Georgia. 

Of that group of 67,600 people, 35% had already voted early prior to Election Day, and 72% planned to vote by the end of Election Day. Among the potential voters contacted, 23% hadn’t voted in 2020, which shows the potential for outreach to low propensity voters. 

As a result of the success with Rally and Source in Georgia, Relentless adopted Source as the voter file for all of Rally’s programs nationally. Typically, organizing software requires clients to bring their own voter files, limited to the district the client is operating in, which can lead to inaccurate data if potential voters don’t match to the file. Sometimes, it’s hard to tell if an “unregistered” person is not registered at all or simply registered in another state. With the nationwide file, the relational organizing programs can be more effective, targeted, and measurable.

Personal outreach resonates with voters and can drive Democratic turnout. Relentless hopes continue to build long-term systems that ensure voters are informed and mobilized to vote in future elections.

By the Numbers

• 1,481 community ambassadors encouraged 67,600 folks to vote, and 23% of those people hadn’t voted in 2020

• Program reached 96% of counties and 94% of precincts in Georgia

• Out of the outreach pool, 35% voted early prior to Election Day and 72% planned to vote by the end of Election Day

“Civitech's Source file is the voter file that powers Rally, which makes it possible to know exactly who we are reaching and ensures we are accurately measuring against our goals. The nationwide voter file helps make our relational organizing more effective, targeted, and measurable.”