In order to increase voter registration and educate potential voters, Voto Latino led communications efforts for National Voter Registration Day (NVRD), a new, national holiday co-founded by various organizations in 2012. NVRD works on the ground and through social media to engage all Americans in all 50 states. Supported by a wide range of organizations, companies, elected officials, entertainers, and volunteers, NVRD’s accomplishments are marked by measurable outcomes that demonstrate a successful call to action. On a quest to make voting fun and accessible, NVRD is a nonpartisan campaign that provides the tools to engage, mobilize, and register voters. The core goals of National Voter Registration Day are to register eligible Americans to vote and raise awareness about the opportunities to vote. According to the US Census, in 2008, 6 million Americans did not vote because they did not know how to register or they missed their state registration deadline. Voto Latino (VL) co-founded National Voter Registration Day to ensure no eligible voter would be left out of another election. The biggest challenge to NVRD is synonymous with the holiday’s objective: to increase voter registration and raise awareness about the opportunities to vote. A difficult task for the communications team at Voto Latino was to shift popular perceptions concerning access to voting. In 2011, 34 states introduced strict voter ID laws, challenging the notion that voting is fun and accessible. In an effort to positively rebrand the voting experience, National Voter Registration Day worked against this negative perception. To rebrand the voting experience, NVRD creatively increased civic engagement and awareness through a medley of fieldwork, digital innovation, and mainstream support. Field strategy included: registration events in every major city, empowering local representatives with the ability to create awareness, and outreach through word of mouth. Responsible for digital tactics, the VL communications team incorporated multiple, proven effective strategies. Technology and social media sites provided a new venue to register to vote online, help others register to vote, and to promote registration by using the hashtag #CelebrateNVRD. As a national and nonpartisan campaign, well-known public figures and nontraditional partners helped establish NVRD as an official holiday in just its second year. On this single day of action, outstanding coordination between field, technology, and media efforts raised public awareness about voter registration. Nine-hundred thirty-one (931) partners engaged voters and volunteers in all 50 states. While volunteers worked at transportation hubs, retail stores, sporting events, and concerts, voter registration was also promoted by a working group of local and national organizations that added coordination and support to the success of the day. Even celebrities helped register voters and generated buzz, contributing to a whole day of blow-out media and communications work. NVRD also leveraged its own facebook and twitter accounts, to motivate voters to use the easy, online voter registration system, which was developed by VL’s digital and communications team. The communication initiative for NVRD proved to be successful, despite 2013 being an off-year election, and a crowded news cycle that followed President Obama’s possible meeting with Iranian President Rouhani and the United Nations, the Clinton Global Initiative, and a Ted Cruz filibuster in the Senate. The cohesive communications push by NVRD’s partners and the use of the communications toolkit and assets created by VL promoted the call to register and reached tens of thousands of voters who would not have been reached otherwise. New technology encouraged organic forms of participation by connecting interested voters with volunteers in their home town. Partners spread the message and built a field presence in every community, implementing NVRD marketing materials in 12 different languages to reach a diverse demographic of potential voters. The collection of field, business, mainstream, and media outreach produced over 55,000 registrations by September 24th 2013, priming NVRD for more registrations in the upcoming 2014 mid-term congressional elections. NVRD was recognized by celebrities and elected officials alike, including tweets from more than 40 members of Congress, 25 Secretaries of State of both parties, and more than 50 mentions by entertainers and public figures. Notable individuals such as Rep. Nancy Pelosi, Tennessee Secretary of State Tre Hargett, NAACP President Ben Jealous, and actress Jessica Alba, all shared their support on this important day. Field work consisted of registration events in every state, totaling 809 events nationwide. Partners coordinated with more than 4,300 volunteers, donating their time and talent to raise awareness across all segments of American voters. National Voter Registration Day is a day of coordinated voter advocacy that facilitates constructive civic participation in new and exciting ways. This national holiday should be recognized by the Shorty Awards as the Best Social Good Campaign because the digital and communications team at Voto Latino, as well as the partners at Bus Federation, League of Women Voters, Nonprofit Vote and others successfully coordinated with 931 partners to increase awareness and drive action. Achievement of our voter advocacy goals are evinced by our communications and field report. Measurable results are listed below. Communications Report Highlights: • 212,365,191 unique impressions • NVRD was mentioned in 704 total news hits between August 19 and October 9 • 327 newscasts • 404 stories online and/or print • 669 “positive" stories • Acknowledged by NPR and the nationally syndicated Rickey Smiley Morning Show • NVRD was also covered by: The Huffington Post, MSNBC, Google, Politico, NBC Latino, Wall Street Journal, CNN, and Yahoo, to name a few Web Stats: • 2,000+ Google mentions Google Ad Words: • 1,560 clicks • 70,607 impressions • 2.21% click through rate (optimal is between 1-3%) Web site traffic (nvrd.org): • 10,511 visits • 9,662 unique visitors • 19,395 page views • 3,332 mobile/tablet visits • 16,063 computer visits Brand Media Coverage: • #CelebrateNVRD trended twice nationally around 10:00 am EST and around 2:00 pm EST. Additionally, #CelebrateNVRD trended for 3 hours in Washington, DC. Field Report Highlights: Membership & Fundraising stats: • 4,499 volunteers • 57,889 registrations • 931 partners • 40+ members of Congress • 50+ entertainers/public figures Partners: • Top four partners that registered the most voters on National Voter Registration Day 2013 (note: excluding governmental agencies): o OurTime.org with 12,008 voter registrations o League of Women Voters with 10,305 voter registrations o Rock The Vote with 4,476 voter registrations o NationalVoterRegistrationDay.org/VotoLatino powered by TurboVote with 1,995 voter registrations • NVRD Materials in 12 Languages: o Chinese o English o French o German o Korean o Portuguese o Russian o Spanish o Tagalog o Thai o Ukrainian o Vietnamese
www.nationalvoterregistrationday.org www.twitter.com/CelebrateNVRD www.facebook.com/CelebrateNVRD www.nationalvoterregistrationday.org/partners
