Resistbot for Organizers

Crowded protest in New York City featuring a protestor holding a sign that reads "Text UOBFYZ to 50409" — Photo by Chris Gelardi

Resistbot can be used to organize for policy change at a local, state, and federal level and organize voter turnout drives in nearly every election in the United States. If you haven't read the guides to creating a petition or a vote drive please start there, and come back here when you're done!

How to Run a Successful Campaign

1. Time and Timing

Successful campaigns require time (a lot of it) and timing. Here's a guide on how a Resistbot organizer repealed a qualified immunity law in New York State. This resulted from a focused effort on a single policy ask that allied elected officials could advance legislation on, and timing. As the organizer notes in his article, this was not a new issue by any means, but in pointing people already looking for an action to take towards their action, they were able to achieve success. The USPS and RBG campaigns were similar in focusing already existing concerns on a single point.

More recently, the Supreme Court decision on ICWA drove the urgency that one of our organizers used to get folks to do something in the legislative branch in case the Roberts Court overturned it. This campaign was not an overnight success. The organizer started the campaign in July of 2022 and pushed on it for over a year, with signatures accelerating towards the decision date. What often seems like an overnight viral phenomenon may have taken months or years to build.

2. Story and a Call to Action

The other hallmark of successful campaigns is that they're built on content that tells an emotional story with a simple call to action. Resistbot can provide the latter; it's the best direct response technology around, but you have to provide the former.

Think of your story as fuel that your viewer needs to continue. The more compelling it is, the more it connects, the more it makes the viewer feel—the more fuel there is for moving forward and taking action. Connect it to something that directly impacts their lives, if you can. Otherwise, it's even harder. Remember, most people don't care about politics and policy until they need to—meaning it directly impacts their lives.

3. Find a Community

Find folks who share your concerns and organize them to share the same call to action online. Continue to do so! Sharing one post or making one ask won't do it. Find folks on social media, Reddit boards, and community groups. Who shares an interest in what you're trying to solve?

How to Build Long-Term Organizing Power

Remember that with Resistbot, you don't need to start from scratch every time. Each campaign you create builds on your progress from the last one.

Diagram of how Resistbot petitions grow. It starts with an organizer sending texts to her followers. Those followers are asked to sign. The signers will promote petitions with coins, share them, and invite others. This in turn drives more followers for the organizer, and more letters to government officials. — An illustration of the Resistbot effect. 1. A campaign starts with texts to an organizer's followers asking to sign. 2. Those followers that sign will often promote, share, invite others. 3. The promotions drive more signers, more followers, and more letters to officials.

Everyone who signs your petition will be prompted to follow you on Resistbot. Becoming a premium member will activate texts to your followers for each campaign you create. This means each petition will get a bigger head start than the previous one. One organizer has over 13,000 followers, all texted each time she starts something new—that's a lot of texts! She's done that through regular actions and community on her daily Substack.

You can also set a custom keyword (as you saw with RBG or USPS) and your profile with the claimClaim your own custom username you can use for your petitions and vote drives. keyword.