Raphael Warnock Is My New Bestie

So far, I’ve tracked 56 emails from Reverend Raphael Warnock since November 10 (average = 5.6 per day). I’ve saved all of them, so contact me if you would like to read them—or assign them to students to analyze.

The sheer volume is fascinating. I could have stopped the flow by unsubscribing if had I opened any of them and seen this grey box. I retrieved them from my trash after talking to a friend and deciding they would make an interesting blog post and repository.

The subject lines alone are worth a class discussion. I’m old fashioned and still use title case, but the Warnock team rarely hits the shift key at all. He also calls me “friend” more than feels comfortable. Clearly, he’s striving for authenticity, but it feels forced, along with his many family photos.

Research shows that emails are effective for political campaigns, partly because they’re so inexpensive, as authors of this 2011 Journal of Political Marketing article explain:

Given the very low cost associated with using email to communicate with supporters, it appears to be an effective means for harvesting small contributions and of providing opportunities for large numbers of voters to elevate their level of participation in the electoral process.

The approach didn’t work for me, but maybe others responded well.