Feeling anxious about elections? Don’t have a lot of time? Don't like to talk to people or have mobility issues? Sounds like you should join a text bank!
Text banking, like phone banking, is an advocacy technique employed especially during election season. True to its name, it's based on phone texts, so there is absolutely no vocal conversation between you and the voter. Last night, I joined MomsRising for their 2022 #MomsVote Texting Challenge. Why were moms gathering on Zoom to text total strangers? Because there are over 75 million registered mom voters in the U.S. If every single mom voted, we’d be well on our way to building a country that works for everyone.
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| Image: Ad for the MomsVote Texting Challenge |
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| Image: Training slide saying we were texting moms in certain states who need a friendly nudge to vote. |
MomsRising, a non-partisan advocacy group taking on critical issues facing women, mothers, and families, says research shows that personalized messages are one of the most effective ways to mobilize voters. They had already directly reached millions of low frequency mom-voters via phone, social media, direct and hand-written mail. Sending mom-to-mom texts is the final layer to making sure that the growing wave of mom-voters continues to grow and is gigantic on Election Day. Volunteers had already sent two million texts this election season. We were part of the last push!
Four Facts about Text Banking
I’d spent hours writing GOTV postcards to other moms and loved it, but been resistant to text banking because of misconceptions I held. Within minutes of the Zoom training, I felt rather silly for not trying it earlier. They quickly set four big worries to rest:
1. No one can see your phone number
MomsRising used a platform called “Impactive,” but any good text banking software generates a phone number for you. Responses back to that number run by the software, not to your personal phone.
2. You can pick a different name
If you’re worried about securing your identity, just type in a different name! I was “Erin” for the night, but by the end, I decided it didn’t really matter since they couldn’t see my phone number nor any other info.
3. You can use your computer instead of your phone
This part is important if, like me, you are of a certain age requiring reading glasses! No squinting or hunching over your phone unless you prefer to do it teen-style.
4. You don’t have to text your responses from scratch
I mistakenly thought text banking was going to involve constant typing. Nope! The platform has pre-written responses to the common questions like, “Stop sending texts” or “You have the wrong number” or “I already voted.” Most of the time, you just select the right response from the list and take them off of the list if they opted out.
How it Works
With those concerns out of the way, we moved onto the actual action. The name of a mom would appear along with pre-written text about voting information. All I had to do was click on the send button. Easy! It only took 5 minutes or less to send out 200 texts, at which point it prompted me to check the inbox.
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| Image: Text banking screen |
Most of the time, there was no response. But every 500 or so, someone would text back with one of the common responses. The most unusual response of the night was, “I don’t like my kids. Don’t text me.” Oh no! We’ll never know what that was about, but I hope that mom has a better day tomorrow. For now, we just removed her from the list.
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| Image: Me smiling on the zoom screen with wine in hand, wearing an "I Voted" sticker. |
For most of the session, I found I could just tap the return key to send messages with my right hand and drink wine with my left hand. I don’t know any other election work offering THAT level of ease and comfort!
Fellow volunteer Jen Lofquist said, “I enjoy feeling like I’m reaching out to voters directly and efficiently.” I agree! I thought it was pretty cool we texted a handy link to give people their voting information. I kept envisioning some mom running around doing mom things, thinking, “Oh no! I forgot to find out where to vote tomorrow,” and then seeing my text pop up.
A Comfortable Space
In less than two hours, volunteers generated 230,000 more texts. The MomsRising text bank Zoom was exactly what I needed to settle my nervous jitters the night before Election Day: a non-partisan space to take action with a bunch of friendly, supportive moms. Text banks for other organization can more issue focused if its for a specific cause or more partisan if its for an individual candidate. I hope you find one that is comfortable and perfect for you!
Image: Book cover
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