{"id":11025,"date":"2026-04-27T04:12:00","date_gmt":"2026-04-27T08:12:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/daviesis.io\/postalgia\/?page_id=11025"},"modified":"2026-04-27T09:24:54","modified_gmt":"2026-04-27T13:24:54","slug":"winning-a-municipal-by-election-with-handwritten-cards","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/daviesis.io\/postalgia\/winning-a-municipal-by-election-with-handwritten-cards\/","title":{"rendered":"Winning a Municipal by-Election with Handwritten Cards"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Winning a Municipal by- Election <\/span> with Handwritten Cards<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Handwritten direct mail<\/a> typically performs at least three times better than printed direct mail, and with its average open rates of greater than 99% can perform dozens of times better than other marketing channels when considering both conversion rates and return on investment (ROI).<\/p>

Perhaps no where is this advantage more dramatically felt than in political direct mail<\/a> for election campaigns.<\/p>

Former United States House of Representatives Speaker Tip O\u2019Neill was know to say that all politics is local, but some politics is more local than others. For example, in the United States and Canada there are \u2013 broadly speaking \u2013 three levels of government: Federal (Congressional Representatives, Senators, and President), State or Provincial (Governor or Premier, State Senator or Member of the Legislative Assembly\/Provincial Parliament, Secretary of State, etc\u2026) and Municipal (Mayors, City Councilors, District Attorneys, etc\u2026).<\/p>

While a Senator from California may represent 38 million people, a member of the Minnesota House of Representatives can win their election with fewer than 4,000 votes. That\u2019s few enough people that you can really meet and converse with every single one of them, and that makes the politics of a race like that very local.<\/p>

Political direct mail typically serves one of three purposes: Fundraising, persuasion, and mobilization AKA GOTV (Get Out The Vote).<\/p>

Back in 2016, Postalgia worked with a school board trustee candidate \u2013 a clear underdog \u2013 to win a municipal by-election using handwritten GOTV notes.<\/p><\/div\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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The Candidate<\/span> <\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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A.L.R. is a teacher and former political activist living in Toronto, and when the incumbent school board trustee in her area suddenly passed away, she was encouraged to seek election to fill his seat.<\/p>

It became clear that amongst the other candidates that would be vying for the position was a candidate whose grandmother and uncle were both popular city council members, and who would be backed by heavy support from volunteers from political machines outside of the district. This made A. a serious underdog.<\/p>

She was able to mobilize her friends, family, and like-minded activists to help her canvass the neighbourhood and meet voters, and the reception she was getting at the doors was enthusiastically supportive, but she was facing a unique challenge when it came to getting those voters to actually vote.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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The Challenge<\/span> <\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Getting out the vote can be a challenge in the best of elections \u2013 Even in hotly-contested and highly consequential US presidential elections, between one third and half of eligible voters don\u2019t turn out to vote. This can be for myriad reasons: Voters get busy, forget their polling details or forget that there is an election happening at all. Amongst the more common reasons cited for voters to skip out on voting is that they don\u2019t think their vote will make a difference, they don\u2019t feel strongly about the candidates, or there is nothing motivating them to vote that is strong enough to overcome whatever else they have going on that day. <\/p>\n

Regardless of the reasons, lots of people plan to vote who do not end up voting, and that presents an opportunity for candidates to motivate, encourage, and facilitate voting amongst their supporters to get an edge. It\u2019s generally agreed that best practices for GOTV (getting out the vote) include giving voters a compelling reason to vote, making their voting information readily available to them (where they need to go and when, etc\u2026), reminding them to vote, and removing any roadblocks to voting. <\/p>\n

This race was especially challenging for a number of reasons:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Most people don\u2019t go out of their way to vote in school board elections \u2013 in fact, only the most wired-in political junkies even know who their school board trustee is.<\/p>\n

This was a by-election, also known as a special election, which means that the rest of the city, province, and country did not similarly have election days. Many people in the word didn\u2019t even know there was an election happening in their area that day.<\/p>\n

Normally at the same time as voters would be voting for their school board trustee, they would also be voting for their city councilor and mayor \u2013 two positions that voters are much more likely to be motivated to re-elect or vote against. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n

When we met with the campaign team, they described how they were building a large list of supporters who had expressed willingness to vote for their candidate, but they were worried about translating those soft verbal commitments into actually putting a ballot into the box on election day. <\/p>\n

We decided that a handwritten card from the candidate reminding them of their conversation with her, reminding them where and when to vote, and asking them one more time for their support would be the best method to drive out voters. <\/p>\n<\/div\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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The Card<\/span> <\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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We designed an enveloped card, rather than a postcard, because we wanted the appeal to seem as personal and authentic as possible, and we figured that most people wouldn\u2019t actually send a postcard. <\/p>\n

The outer envelope was handwritten, and the notecard inside was a simple printed design with a handwritten message<\/a>. The goal was to make it look like the candidate had pulled a card off of a stack that she had pre-printed, and then written a message to the voters. <\/p>\n

We used real stamps, again to give it the feel of something that had been personally sent by a candidate appealing to a voter with whom they had had a conversation. <\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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The Results<\/span> <\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Since this was a municipal by-election with no seriously controversial issues or candidates, the total voter turnout (as a % of eligible voters) was 8.67%. <\/strong><\/p>

Obviously that is way, way lower than a normal election for the city of Toronto.<\/strong><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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Of the people who received handwritten letters from the candidate, voter turnout was<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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33.8%<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Of course, there were other things happening to drive turnout on election day amongst those who ended up voting for the candidate, and those who received handwritten letters had also spoken with the candidate directly, which likely heavily influenced their decision to get out and vote.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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290%<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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increase over the average voter turnout in the ward.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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It appears that the handwritten letters were extremely effective in reminding voters where and when to vote, and motivating them to get out and vote on the day of the by-election.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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The candidate ended up winning the election by<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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116 votes or 2.85%<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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of the total vote.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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The candidate ended up winning the election by 116 votes \u2013 or 2.85% of the total vote \u2013 in a nailbiter in which her handwritten GOTV efforts certainly were a factor. She has now been serving on the Toronto District School Board for more than 8 years, having been re-elected twice since her first by-election victory.<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Winning a Municipal by- Election with Handwritten Cards Handwritten direct mail typically performs at least three times better than printed direct mail, and with its average open rates of greater…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"elementor_header_footer","meta":{"content-type":"","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-11025","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"yoast_head":"\nWinning a Municipal by-Election with Handwritten Cards - Postalgia<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Winning a Municipal by-Election with Handwritten Cards - Postalgia\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Winning a Municipal by- Election with Handwritten Cards Handwritten direct mail typically performs at least three times better than printed direct mail, and with its average open rates of greater…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/daviesis.io\/postalgia\/winning-a-municipal-by-election-with-handwritten-cards\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Postalgia\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-04-27T13:24:54+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"6 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/daviesis.io\\\/postalgia\\\/winning-a-municipal-by-election-with-handwritten-cards\\\/\",\"url\":\"https:\\\/\\\/daviesis.io\\\/postalgia\\\/winning-a-municipal-by-election-with-handwritten-cards\\\/\",\"name\":\"Winning a Municipal by-Election with Handwritten Cards - 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