SU ELECTIONS 2016
CAMPAIGNING GUIDE
CONTENTS Before You Campaign Why are you running?
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What do you believe in? Who can help you?
During Your Campaign How do you get the message out?
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What are the rules? How do you succeed?
After You Campaign
How do you learn from what you’ve done? How do you handle victory or defeat? How do you make the most of your experience?
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GUIDE TO CAMPAIGNING First off, congratulations on taking your first step down the wild and wonderful journey that is running for election! Before we start, we think it’s safe to say that standing for an election in the Students’ Union isn’t like standing for election anywhere else – it’s not like a General Election where everyone stands around wearing rosettes and shouting about the economy! As you might have guessed, Students’ Union elections are more fun, relaxed, and a great opportunity to meet new people! This guide will tell you everything you need to know about before, during, and after the election period so you can make the most of this unique experience. So, let’s start shall we? Settle down, and maybe grab a cup of tea with your pen and paper.
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BEFORE WHAT ARE YOU RUNNING FOR?
out our key details guide (available for free from the Students’ Union).
Now this may seem rather selfexplanatory, but making sure you choose the right role for you is crucial to whether you…
WHO ARE YOU AND WHAT DO YOU STAND FOR?
A. Win the election, and… B. Have a good year once you’ve won! Lots of people tend to choose a position because they don’t want to run against a friend, or there’s a lack of competition, or because they think the title sounds nice. You should choose a position that you are truly interested in and where you feel your ideas could change student lives for the better. Don’t let anyone pressure you in to running for something you’re not interested in – you might not enjoy it, and the position could have gone to someone who really wanted it. Hold your ground and stand for the position you want; it’s as easy as that. To find out more about the different positions we have up for grabs, check
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So you’ve decided what you want to run for and need to tell people why they should vote for you. Most candidates will produce a manifesto – an outline of what you want to achieve if you get elected. This needs to be no more than 300 words and should be broken down into three key sections… 3. Why you are running 4. What you believe in 5. What you will change Your manifesto may be the first thing students see when they are deciding whether or not to vote for you, so be sure you make a good first impression! Try to think of ways to make your manifesto stand out from the crowd – most students won’t want to read 30 manifestos that look and sound the same. As we’re such a helpful and friendly bunch here at the SU, we’ve produced a guide for you which contains everything you need to know about writing your manifesto. If you feel it will help, you can bring a manifesto
draft to the Student Voice team for feedback.
YOU CAN’T DO IT ALONE! Though we believe you‘re all super heroes, it’s not always possible to get your message to over 20,000 students by yourself. You’re welcome to give it a go and prove us wrong, but from experience we know it’s usually best to get a campaign team together. Invite your friends round, get a pizza in (remember, they’re doing you a favour!) and get brainstorming. It’s important that your group be as wide and diverse as possible to get maximum reach in the student body, and that they’re actually going to go out and talk to students – not sit in the corner and eat all your sweets!
TO SLATE OR NOT TO SLATE Slates are not just what you find on your roof – they’re groups of candidates who run together and support each other to get elected. They share a name, slogan, publicity and campaigners. It’s completely up to you if decide to join a slate or run as an individual candidate, as both have pros and cons. For example; if you run on a slate you get the benefit of having more people out campaigning for you. However, the slate and their supporters are also
campaigning for four other people, whereas even if you’re running alone with fewer overall supporters, they’re campaigning solely for you! During the candidate briefing and training, you will get to meet other candidates and you can decide if a slate is appropriate for your campaign. Just remember, you have to let us know by February 29th.
THEME YOUR CAMPAIGN When thinking about your campaign, you need to consider how you’ll capture the voter’s attention. One way you could do this is by theming your campaign – who doesn’t love a theme? Does your name rhyme with other words? Can it be associated with a famous brand? Think along those lines to make yourself stand out. For example; if your name is Jack, your slogan could be “Be Part of the Pack and Vote for Jack”. Your campaign team could dress up as crayons (why not, right?) and you could even go as far as handing out crayons to students with a picture of your face on them. By keeping a consistent message throughout, students will recognise who you are and what you’re standing for.
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USING YOUR IMAGINATION The election process is supposed to be fun, so make your campaign fun! Voters are usually only proactive in the pre-voting phase if what you’re asking them to do is enjoyable, so try to use your imagination and think of something completely out of the box. Perhaps you’ve got some friends that can dance (or maybe they can’t!) who could start a flash mob – or maybe you could organise a campus-wide conga line to help get the message of your campaign out there. The possibilities are endless so get thinking!
GET ONLINE You can start campaigning online straight away, so it makes sense to start building up your online presence. Start following people on Facebook and Twitter, and get inventive with platforms like Snapchat and Instagram so students can see (and start talking about) your campaign. With free tools like Hootsuite, you can even start programming in your messages in advance – this allows you to spend half an hour sorting posts and tweets so you don’t have to live 24/7 on social media later on in your campaign. A word of warning though; be sure not to schedule anything that could change or become irrelevant/ offensive in some way between when you write it and when it goes out. Finally, students like shiny things! Use
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pictures and videos to make your content pop, and think about sharing other interesting content that might be relevant to the issues in your campaign from news outlets and entertaining online articles.
ON THE TELLY It might never make it to actual televisions, but it’s well worth creating a campaign video all about why people should vote for you. There are loads of examples online of really good campaign videos, and who knows – if it’s good enough, it could go viral. Choose a good song, don’t make it too long and don’t talk too much. Here’s some of our favourite examples… • Vote Becks (VPAP) and Bethany (VPAE), Brighton 2015 • Vote George #1 for LUU Community Officer, Leeds 2014 • Jason - Co-President Sports & Development (Thrift Shop Cover Parody), Royal Holloway 2014 • Rachel Holland for SU President - Uptown Funk Parody, Leicester 2015 • Vote Naa For Gen Sec, Manchester 2015
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DURING TALK TO PEOPLE If you have difficulty getting your message across to people, you’re going to have difficulty during the campaigning period. There are currently over 20,000 students in Huddersfield, so make sure you get out there and start speaking to as many as possible. Feel free to pop in to lectures and ask the tutor if you can have five minutes to talk to everyone, and keep it short! Doing lecture shout-outs is a great way to address a large amount of students quickly.
GET OUT OF STUDENT CENTRAL This may be news to some of you, but the University of Huddersfield has more than one building! You need to make sure that you get out of Student Central and around campus – don’t just target the same few hundred people in a specific area, as students tend to frequent the same buildings during their studies. This is where your campaign team will be useful – don’t have them all together. Spread them all over campus, every building, and get them to speak to as many people as
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possible. You have a better chance of winning if you leave Student Central.
LOOK AFTER YOURSELF Even though the actual voting period is only three days, it’s likely going to be both the best and worst part of your campaign as results filter through, so you have to look after yourself. The best advice we can give is plan ahead – the week before voting, make some food and freeze it so you can just microwave it on campus, carry some drinks in your bag ready to go, and have someone close that can do regular check-ins with you. If not, you might into full campaign mode and not sleep for three days – it happens all the time! Talking of sleep, voting closes at 9:00pm each day (and 4:00pm on the final day) so there’s no need for you to be out talking to drunken people ‘til 3:00am – go to bed! We know we’re starting to sound a bit like your mother right now, but please do rest because voters don’t want to be talking to a hungover zombie the next day.
STICK TO THE RULES Rules are present for many reasons, and they help to ensure the election is a fair and transparent process. We
don’t have many rules but the ones we do have are important – any breaches of the rules can result in your removal from the election. Further to this; if your campaign team break the rules then both they and you will be penalised as they are acting on your behalf. We advise giving your team a copy of the rules and holding a briefing to make sure they stick to them. You can see a copy of the rules and regulations here.
CAMPAIGN RUCKSACK During the election period, you might find yourself carrying around a mountain of things such as t-shirts,
pens, paper, banners, scissors, string, blu-tac, food, drink, sweets, chargers, tablets… you get the idea! Pretty much everything but the kitchen sink, it seems. We recommend getting yourself a campaign rucksack so you can keep it all together – trust us, it may save your life.
ENJOY IT Elections are supposed to be a positive experience so make sure you enjoy yourself and have fun. Don’t get caught up in any campaign rivalries or negative campaigning – it won’t help your chances, and people are more likely to vote for you if you come across as an approachable, friendly person who is enjoying the campaigning process.
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AFTER CELEBRATE EITHER WAY When it comes down to it, only five people can win – sad, we know! You should be proud of yourself for getting this far, because many potential candidates don’t even get close. Celebrate and embrace what we hope was a fantastic election experience, and if you do lose it’s not the end of the world! You will have gained some brilliant friends, stories to tell, and something really useful for your CV.
SAY THANK YOU You didn’t get this far alone, so remember to thank your campaigners,
the people who voted for you, and everyone in-between. Be sure to make time for this and don’t miss anyone obvious out – remember that friend you called at 2:00am asking if they think blue and green would work well on a poster? They would love a mention!
WRITE DOWN WHAT YOU’VE DONE By standing for election, you will have gained loads of useful skills – from public speaking to project and volunteer management. Make sure you write down all of this because when it comes to applying for jobs, these are the skills employers are looking for!
THAT’S IT! That’s all you need to know about standing for election. There’s a lot to take in, but remember the Students’ Union is here for you every step of the way. If you have any questions, just pop up to Floor 5 of Student Central and we’ll be happy to help with any question you may have.
ALL THE BEST, AND GOOD LUCK! The Student Voice Team
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#HUDVOTES
HUDDERSFIELD.SU/ELECTIONS