88th Legislative Session - Texas Public Charter Schools Association (TPCSA)
As part of a new expanded strategic communication strategy, I contributed the digital portion of a "surround sound" approach to campaigns that supported individual legislative priorities.
This innovative method of strategic communication ensured that lawmakers heard our messaging via audience targeting, new platforms, and rapid mobilization of advocates at key moments.
Together, the entire TPCSA team created and distributed research, testimony, and talking points that were tailored to every kind of public charter school advocate.
Ultimately, these campaigns earned great results. Among other wins, the Legislature passed a landmark anti-discrimination bill that will keep millions of dollars in classrooms - House Bill 1707.
Website Remodel
To begin the campaign, I created a digital hub for advocates — one page that brought together information about bills, updates on their progress, calls to action, and “Charter 101” materials for busting any myths.
As of June 2023, the webpage had a committed base of 2,200 unique viewers who spent an average of 4.5 minutes per visit.
For lawmakers, I created beautiful pages with profiles of charter enrollment by district and videos about our community’s top legislative priorities.
Detailed One-Pagers
Throughout the session, I created several compelling one-pagers from scratch and also worked with vendors to update pre-made one-pagers for both advocates and lawmakers.
I kicked us off by creating our Legislative Priorities one-pager from scratch, detailing what exactly we planned to fight for on behalf of public charter schools in Texas. Researchers on staff then provided a summary of amazing academic performance data and a new analysis of charter students’ college and career success. With that data, I began collaborating with vendors to create a series of one-pagers that we would distribute throughout the session.
Strategic Social Media
I leveraged our social media platforms to inform our supporters about key bills, empower them to learn more, and inspire them to take action.
Many of the strategic posts directed advocates to issue specific landing pages with important facts and engaging videos. Our audience took nearly 700 actions on social media (such as sharing and engaging with our posts).
The communication team also worked together to live-tweet committee hearings, allowing supporters to follow along, and act as another megaphone to educators and parents who testified at the Capitol. These were some of our most popular and widely shared posts.
Geo-Targeted Digital Ads
I then created engaging videos — from parent-to-parent messages to “explainer” policy summaries — that set up actions for our supporters. Then I coordinated with vendors to strategically target these video ads, especially to parents and teachers who live in the districts of important education committee members.
We ran these ads on more platforms than ever before — including streaming services such as Hulu and on websites that users visited. The digital ads racked up 60,000 impressions.
In the days before an important hearing or vote, I ensured digital ads targeting lawmakers were geofenced to their work and their homes, covering both the Capitol and their neighborhoods of residence. These ads grabbed the attention of lawmakers and staff, generating 145,500 impressions and 83,000 video views — at a cost of only 2-3 cents per video view.
