Open Letter to Barack Obama’s Campaign Team

Barack (are we on that level yet?),

Your campaign in 2008 was one of the first in modern politics to take advantage of new technology to increase awareness and attract a new generation of voters. It seems to me that your campaign for re-election will most likely include more of these efforts. And I believe there is one tool that your campaign team should investigate this time around.

I propose that you use Kickstarter, a wildly successful crowdfunding site, to raise money from the general public.

It’s been a longstanding tradition for political campaigns to seek contributions from the general population via door to door campaigning and phone calls. It’s time to take that philosophy to the modern era. Reach a whole new audience and allow those contributions to grow tremendously by reach a younger, involved demographic.

Using Kickstarter’s donation levels, you can offer giveaways and gifts to people for different size donations. Raffle off a dinner with the president for $500, a chance to meet the president for $250, a free White House tour for $100. And use the social media presence that you have already given yourself to push people there online.

The bulk of your donations, I am sure, will still come from large corporations and special interest groups. That’s not a knock on you as much as it is on politics in general. But I’d be willing to bet that the size of contributions that you get from individuals grows because of Kickstarter.

If you’re interested in hiring me to run this part of your campaign for you, feel free to get in touch.

Sincerely,

Zach Heller