'To Boldly Go Where No Man Has Gone Before'

To reach out to an audience that may not be receiving information from the traditional sources.

Some politicians get it.  Some don't.

Dan Riehl:

A Lesson In New Media For The GOP From The GOP

As a result of my recent dust-up with the Beltway GOP, J. Garren Shipley, Communications Director for the Virginia GOP happened by the blog, read my damn the GOP posts and sent me an email. I believe he's relatively new to the slot and they want to make blogs a big part of their efforts this year, but weren't sure how to proceed. I sent him my phone number, asked him to give me a call, so we could discuss things from a blogger's perspective.

We talked of several issues that, as a blogger, I think GOP orgs can do to establish better relationships with bloggers. One thing I suggested was making them feel like they're part of the team, as opposed to someone to be kept at arms length. After the call, the VA GOP decided to release a pretty good new video exclusively to a couple of bloggers, as opposed to simply hosting it, or giving it to the media first.

They shared the video exclusively with From on High and Bearing Drift. You can view it there [actually here]. He emailed today to say they've gotten the best response to a video, blog-wise, than they've ever gotten in the past.

From Garren's email:

"You were absolutely right... freakishly so."

We talked briefly again today. I wanted permission to post this. He laughed and said, doing it occured [sic] to him after our talk and he couldn't believe he hadn't thought of it before. Political comms people may have to think differently in a new media age. But when it comes to working with bloggers, in my opinion, it isn't always that hard if they're willing to take a blogger's perspective into consideration.

Well, we are a frightening bunch.

But we are able to communicate with people who have walked away from the old media too in ways that prove to be powerfully effective.

Got a message worth disseminating?  Tired of giving it to the Washington Post only to have it disappear into the black hole or have it distorted beyond anything recognizable?  Think of the weblog world.

We are the new media.  We are another channel of communication.

And we are better lookin'.

By the way, thanks, Dan, for the mention.