Case studies emt santos

Case Studies
Information
Results
Facts
By Luis G. Lopez, Ravi Singh,
where everyday is a campaign & Dr. Dennis Anderson
www.electionmall.com

Table of Contents

Colombia Ups the Ante in Latin American
E-Democracy
Introduction
Fate & Setup
The tactics – 50 days to catch up
Colombians respond
Landslide victory
The Future of E-Democracy in Colombia

Colombia Ups the Ante in Latin American E-Democracy

Introduction
by Luis G. Lopez, Ravi Singh, and Dr. Dennis Anderson / Sep 28 2010

By the end of April in Colombia, former Bogota mayor Antanas Mockus’ Green Wave had become a
serious challenge to Juan Manuel Santos, the Colombian presidential candidate who was synonymous
to continuation of outgoing President Álvaro Uribe’s popular 8-year term. Appealing to a large mass of
idealistic youngsters, who comprised a high percentage of the estimated 15 million-plus Internet users
in Colombia, Mockus was king of the digital world, with more than 600,000 fans on Facebook, a strong
following on Twitter, and banner ads running in all leading publications in the country.

Enter an 80-person strong Internet task force assembled in just 72 hours in a war room in Bogota, led by
Election-Mall.com and local operatives. The challenges: neutralize the Green Wave; appeal to a pool of
young voters who were digital-savvy and thirsty for change; bring innovative technology to Colombia’s
political landscape. And of course, get Santos elected.

http://www.campaignsandelections.com/casestudies/176052/colombia-ups-the-ante-in-latin-american-edemocracy.thtml


Fate & Setup

When Ravi Singh, founder and CEO of ElectionMall.com, a non-partisan technology company powered
by Microsoft, landed in Colombia for the first time, he was to speak in Medellin and head straight back
home to Washington D.C. Little did he know that Santiago Valencia, a young Colombian politician,
would lure him into a great e-democracy adventure: Recovering 6-12 months of lost time in digital
initiatives, and catch up to Mockus’ leadership on the Web, in less than 50 days. With a client list that
has exceeded 1,000 campaigns under his belt, and an ongoing negotiation to become Microsoft’s
political software arm in the works, Singh went straight to work. With a 24/7 work discipline, and a brutal
drive that overcame culture, nationality and race, Mr. Singh convinced the Santos campaign and Sistole
– a direct marketing agency that is part of Sancho’s, the candidate’s advertising agency - to build a
digital War Room in little less than three days. The War Room included a mesh of local staff that grew
from 5 to 80 in aweek; fully-secure network servers; BlackBerrys for the entire team; iPhones for the
advanced task force; video streaming from live events; a walled-off conference room, balcony, loft-style
living room space, a metricswall, and an abundant supply of Red Bull, potato chips, candy and
anti-bacterial soap.



The tactics – 50 days to catch up

On day one, the candidate’s official website went pitch-black. It wasn’t a local hacker or neighboring
Venezuela launching a cyber attack. It was actually the beginning of a 50-day, highly-orchestrated set of
tactics that had one goal in mind: Getting Santos elected. With individuals responding to names like Mr.
Twitter, Ms. Delicious, Video-guy, or Mr. SMS – the team’s operatives were rolling. Tactics were laid out
across the War Room in sequential order: A countdown from day 50 (roughly May 3rd), all the way to
day zero (June 20th, second-round Election Day). The team would execute precise tactics, and the
competition would wake up to them and respond a week or so later.

Among the most innovative tactics were an iPhone app, where users received daily feeds from The U
Party (Santo’s political party) and general election and candidate news; an advanced team feeding live
streams via Ustream with iPhones from the towns or cities where Santos campaigned; an SMS short
code (677) that worked across all national carriers (Comcel, Movistar, Tigo) for opt-in SMS strategies led
by local company SigmaMovil; pop-corn debate watch parties (including instructions for preparing
pop-corn); targeted search engine marketing; cascade-style online advertising, and a real-time Wall of
Shame, where any citizen could post offensive material related to any candidate, in order to combat the
dirty war that was happening across social media.

The Mockus started emulating the Santos tactics, almost one by one, but with a one-week delay. And
when the Mockus campaign began its rebuttal, the Santos campaign was already launching a new tactic.



Colombians respond

Within 3 weeks of the Internet Task Force’s efforts, a shift in perception was achieved: Santos went from
“old-school” and “boring” to become a superhero with an exciting SUPER SANTOS video game, where
the candidate fought poverty, corruption, unemployment and drug trafficking in a Super Mario Bros-like
environment. The main Web site – SantosPresidente.com – received more than 40,000 visits each day.

More than 4 million opt-in e-mails were assembled in 6 weeks. Individual tactics like the Baby-Santos
video were receiving 11,000 views a single day. Mockus also experiences a number of high profile gaffes
– saying he “admired” unpopular Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez and that he’d extradite current
Colombian President Uribe to Ecuador – which the Santo campaign aggressively highlighted in its online
messaging.

In the first-round of balloting on May 30th, Santos totaled nearly 7 million votes, and doubled the
opposition by 47 to 22 percent with seven other candidates dividing the rest of the vote. Far from
considering “a job done,” the Internet Task Force, at that point being dubbed “The Web 2.0 Victory
Team,” went into high-gear.



Landslide victory

It would be too ambitious to say that the Web 2.0 Victory Team got Santos elected. Or that – like was the
case in the United States with Barack Obama – the elections were defined online. But, it is fair to say
that, for a people who didn’t quite grasp the power of digital media before the 2010 presidential
elections, history was made.

Juan Manuel Santos, now a Blackberry-toting, tweeting citizen, is committed to continue using
technology, social media, and innovations on the web, to stay close to the citizens. With a highly profiled
database and an understanding of the power of the Web, Santos will continue to use the technology in
his government. Colombia, now one of the most solid democracies in Latin America, was recently
dubbed the “Star of the South” by U.S.-based Newsweek magazine. The country showed the world a
successful electoral process in 2010. The use of the Internet, Social Media, Mobile Marketing, Online
Videos, and Search technologies among others gave the Santos campaign an edge that caught the
competition – and the country – by surprise, and that contributed to a victory that was well received by
most Colombians and the international community.

Luis G. Lopez is director of LGL/Latin Medios, a digital agency in Bogota. A self-proclaimed Digital Freak, he acted
as head liaison for Ravi Singh in the Internet Task Force. Ravi Singh, known as the “Campaign Guru” is CEO and
Founder of ElectionMall.com, a non-partisan political technology company powered by Microsoft. Dr. Dennis
Anderson, co-author, is chairman and professor of management and information technology at St. Francis College
in New York City. He received his Ph.D. and M.Phil. from Columbia University.


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