01/17/2020

Study: Shoe Leather is More Effective Than Social Media

Digital-minded tactics do not resonate as much as face-to-face contact

Social media seems to be where all the political discussion is these days. But is that medium having a real effect on legislators?

Maybe not. A new report from The Showalter Group, an advocacy-minded consultancy, finds that digital-minded tactics such as social media and email do not resonate as much as face-to-face contact. Despite this, emails to legislators tend to be the most popular grassroots advocacy approach, used by 78 percent of respondents, and organizations were making more of an investment in social media (21 percent) than face-to-face communication or events (19 percent each).

Amy Showalter, the group’s principal and a primary author of ‌The Grassroots Influence Pulse 2019, notes that email and social media are widely used for advocacy reasons—but they may actually be going against the primary cause.

Please select this link to read the complete article from Associations Now.