Advocacy Groups Embrace "Extreme Data Mining" to Prove Clout on Capitol Hill

Emails to Legislators from SuperVoters and FatCats Grab Attention

Aristotle previews 'game-changing technology' for separating grass tops from Astroturf

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Feb 06, 2012, 07:15 ET

MIAMI, Feb. 6, 2012 /PRNewswire/ -- At the National Grassroots Conference in Miami, non-partisan political technology powerhouse Aristotle International unveiled what many representatives of the nation's most effective advocacy groups are heralding as a powerful new weapon for influencing legislative battles on Capitol Hill.

The software, called VerifiedVoter™, stamps an electronic watermark on emails being sent to Hill offices designating that the author of the email is a real, live registered voter rather than a computer-generated form letter. The system also flags emails coming from a 'SuperVoter' (one who votes in primaries) and a 'Fat Cat' (one who has a history of donating to political causes). The new data-mining tool relies on advanced algorithms that mine the Aristotle's highly accurate lists of 187 million registered voters and 4.4 million political contributors.

The objective: to maximize the impact of emails coming from constituents with clout.

Until now, organizations with a political interest have been sending their supporters, members or employees to government affairs websites where they are prompted to sign a petition or submit a form letter that is then sent to the congressional offices. Studies have shown that the deluge of emails from campaigns that generated thousands of identical comments on an issue have had diminishing impact. Offices are swamped with hundreds or sometimes thousands of emails on both sides of many topics. Legislative staffers sifting thru the mountains of often identical correspondence have taken to calling such campaigns 'Astroturf' as opposed to more genuine 'grassroots' expressions of support or opposition. The result has been that the impact of such emails is now widely discounted by those on the receiving end.

Elected officials are attuned to paying attention to what their constituents have to say, especially those who regularly vote and/or contribute to their re-election. With limited budgets and bandwidth, they are eager to focus their attention on responding to actual constituents.

With VerifiedVoter, grassroots directors for trade associations, advocacy organizations and issue-based groups who generate such correspondence in order to influence elected officials can maximize the impact of each email. Lobbyists for these organizations can produce a "Political Impact Statement" that totals up, in real-time, the political demographics of those writing on a particular issue in each district and present it to the congressional office.

Aristotle CEO John Aristotle Phillips said, "Elected officials get lots of emails on many issues. Positively identifying constituents and spotlighting why their opinion needs to be taken seriously, is the key. This technology is going to take grassroots campaigns to a new level. Legislators are more likely to respond to someone they know is a voting and/or contributing constituent in their district."

Irica Solomon from the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies said, "It's a game changer. It makes all the difference in the world if you're getting hundreds of emails on a bill, to know which ones are coming from real live constituents who vote in primaries and have made political contributions. It's that simple."

Aristotle is also the first political data provider to offer data reflecting the 2012 congressional redistricting lines. Every ten years the Federal government conducts a national census and the official results from 2010 show that eight states have gained congressional seats and ten states have lost seats. Most other states that did not gain or lose a seat have changed, which means that the demographics have likely changed. It is invaluable for legislators, campaigns and advocacy groups to know where the lines fall and who is or is not in each district.

About Aristotle
For more than 25 years, every occupant of the White House — Democrat and Republican — has used Aristotle products and/or services, in addition to many U.S. Senators, members of the U.S. House of Representatives, and Democratic and Republican state party organizations. The company's technology was featured Monday, January 9, 2012 on BBC and PBS in correspondent Katty Kay's reporting on the 2012 presidential election contests.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-16467412

SOURCE Aristotle