First-time candidates feel lost the moment they announce. I'm the person who tells you what comes next.
Caitlin Huxley is a political campaign consultant with nearly 20 years of experience working on races across the country. She is a regular contributor to Campaigns & Elections and the author of Ancient Wisdom for Modern Campaigns, a book that applies Sun Tzu's principles to modern political strategy.
Caitlin has spent nearly 20 years working on political campaigns across the country, from city council races to congressional districts. She works one-on-one with first-time candidates to make sure they know what comes next and can make decisions with confidence. If you are running for office and feeling overwhelmed, let's talk.
Find out what working together looks like and whether it is a fit for your race.
See How It WorksMobile phone carriers didn't build spam filters because they hate political campaigns. They built them, at least in part, because voters hate political calls.
After nearly 20 years in the field, one lesson sticks harder than any poll number or predictive model: people stay where they feel seen. That's exactly why your volunteer retention plan is your ground game.
Contact Stacking is about reaching the right people, in the right way, at the right time. That's the game. It means blending every outreach channel into one responsive system where every touch builds on the last.
You've been promising your exhausted team they were almost done, but suddenly you're facing provisional ballots and maybe even a recount. Here's how to shift gears fast and stay organized.
AI is a powerful brainstorming and coding assistant, but it cannot replace the experienced human judgment a campaign runs on — and handing it the wheel will cost you.
Most campaigns wait too long to start knocking on doors. They wait until they're fully staffed and fully funded, until there's a yard sign design, and they have walk cards in-hand. By the time they finally launch their field program...
I recently attended an event that was the first of its kind in Europe: the Political Tech Summit in Berlin. It was full of campaign focused discussions, like what went right/wrong in the last European elections.
Two things can be true simultaneously: every race is unique and every race that has enough of a budget will see direct mail sent to voters. Cycle after cycle, campaigns have relied on mail programs.
Summer is when campaigns start to heat up. Voters start paying attention around the Fourth of July, and it creates a momentum that pretty much continues until Election Day.
Sun Tzu's manual has shaped the strategic thinking of leaders for centuries, highlighting the blend of calculation and intuition required for achieving victory on the battlefield.
A campaign plan is meant to be a living document, and the planning process is never truly over. Don't shy away from changing details you've settled on if new information comes to light.
Voter strategy is not a one-size-fits-all solution. If you're not tailoring your campaign plan to your exact circumstances, you're losing efficiency, leaving voters on the table, and maybe handing your opponent the advantage they need to win.
