Getting your fax straight

New Services are Helping Campaigns Raise Money and Rally Supporters

It's yet another season for debates, town hall meetings, voter rallies and registration drives. In the process, candidates will need to raise funds and issue thousands of press releases, position statements, rebuttal attacks and internal communications. For candidates, campaign managers, staff, and political consultants, the fax machine is leveling the playing field.

During the past six years fax machines have become a necessity in campaigns. From presidential to local races, timing is crucial. The pace of politics quickens each cycle.

Enter fax technology, which makes communication in political campaigns a centralized and more controlled process.

* Broadcast Faxing. Service bureaus have numerous dedicated fax lines, enabling them to simultaneously send multiple copies of the same document to a predetermined list. Campaign managers need only send a fax document once. Busy numbers are automatically retried until the document is delivered. Eliminating hand faxing, printing costs, labeling, and postage, broadcast faxing saves organizers valuable time.

Fundraising efforts are being streamlined through fax technology. The Republican Governors Association, for example, uses fax services to send personalized memos informing its contributors of upcoming events.

"We are generally given very little notice for events, such as last minute breakfasts, which are planned around visiting Governors' schedules. With the help of our fax service bureau, we can send personalized faxes on our letterhead to each of our donors within hours," said Felicia Frederick, Fundraising Coordinator for the association.

"We also use fax services for our planned events, such as our recently completed America's Majority Dinner. A large portion of the success of this gala was because our contributors were kept informed of the event. The production time required to mail invitations would have choked our staff. By sending the invitations, as well us updated agendas, via fax we were able to reach all of our donors quickly while saving time and money," added Frederick.

An equally important part of successful fundraising is the day-to-day correspondence with donors, party members and the press. Faxes help press secretaries be more efficient in their "damage control" efforts, enabling them to respond immediately to attacks on the candidate, negative media coverage and low poll ratings.

The Dole For President Campaign, for example, uses fax broadcasting to send approximately 2,000 to 3,000 faxes a day. It alerts the "troops" and media of Senator Dole's positions and appearances as the itinerary and issues change from hour to hour.

Anne Gavin, Director of Communications for the 1996 Republican National Convention, uses PC-based fax broadcasting to distribute information. A software communications program gives the GOP a gateway to the fax bureau. Specific names and media targets can be selected from the software database then uploaded to the bureau which distributes the fax.

"We can send our message out simultaneously to all recipients, which creates a bigger impact than manual faxing or conventional mailing," said Gavin. As the national convention nears, the RNC anticipates increasing their fax volume from one or two press releases a day to multiple releases sent to local press and supporters.

Although fax broadcasting is most commonly used among campaign organizers, other services include: fax on demand, toll free fax response, and options which enable users to merge and personalize documents as well as fax through the Internet. Service providers also offer full accountability of delivered faxes through detailed reports which document who received the information and the time of delivery.

* Enhanced Fax Merging. Fax technology is also giving Political Action Committees such as GOPAC and Americans For Tax Reform, the ability to be more frequent with their messages. PAC contact packets, letters from employees and members, newsletters for internal audiences and information on candidates can be quickly made available to callers through a fax on demand service, or can be personalized through enhanced fax merging.

The Democratic National Committee also uses Enhanced FaxMerge[TM] to personalize their messages, names and titles which can be font-matched and inserted into original text at any point. The DNC supplies the body text along with a list of recipients. The fax bureau merges the information, font-matches the names and distributes it to the list.

* Fax on demand. Fax on demand services can provide access to media kits, candidate schedules and issue positions anywhere in the world, through a touch tone phone and fax machine. Callers select information which is sent immediately to their fax machine.

* Toll-Free Fax Response. Fundraising efforts are also being augmented by "toll free fax" response, which allows campaign managers to receive faxed responses to surveys as well as inquiries and orders for central collection. A toll free 800 number is provided to fundraisers where no busy signals are encountered, which increases the chances of securing donations from interested parties.

* Data Confidentiality. The question of confidentiality arises when campaign information is distributed. Service bureaus can now offer software that encrypts data electronically until a hard copy is generated at the receivers' end, a useful option particularly with information concerning campaign funds and strategic plans.

* Selecting a Service Bureau. The key to successfully using fax services is choosing the correct service bureau. Campaign managers should not assume that just because a company advertises enhanced fax or broadcast capabilities, that quality service and stability are guaranteed. A provider's track record should be examined along with client references. Inquire as to the methods of ensuring confidentiality of documents faxed through their service. It is also important to inquire as to whether the service can include a custom "disclaimer statement" on the cover sheet to assure the document is read by the intended recipient only.

Because not all faxing can be done during normal business hours, it is especially important that your bureau offers service 24 hours a day. In selecting an outside fax service, the campaign manager should inquire as to its delivery capacity, specifically the number of fax lines offered to support simultaneous transmissions. The number of outbound dedicated fax lines is a measure of company size and delivery capacity. In addition, a service bureau without power-fail backup and redundant system capacity could result in delayed delivery with system failure.

Using fax technology is more cost efficient than traditional mailing because of the elimination of production and delivery costs. Besides saving on postage, the use of hired workers and volunteers for manual labor such as faxing and stuffing envelopes can be highly curtailed.

The mass distribution of information no longer moves at a snail's pace. Time and timing is everything in today's heated political arena. Fax services are now crucial communication tools as political candidates struggle to position themselves and their messages ahead of the pack.

Michael Donohoe is a Market Development Manager for Xpedite Systems, Inc., the largest enhanced fax communications service provider in the world.

COPYRIGHT 1996 Campaigns & Elections, Inc.
COPYRIGHT 2004 Gale Group