'Get out the vote' operations critical in tight race

Although many look at opinion polls to forecast what candidate will likely win on Oct. 19, the ability of the parties to get their supporters out come election day could well be the deciding factor in a tight race.

"Five percent difference inpolling meansnothing on election dayif you can't get your vote out the door, or the other guy does it better,"saidBill Tieleman, a communications consultant andformer NDP strategist.

"You can overcome fairlysignificantmargins if you have theability. If youget50 per cent [turnout] and the other guy gets 33 per cent, then itdoesn'tmatter if you're down [in the polls]."

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Conservative strategist Jason Lietaer agreed, stressing the importance of having the resources to getyour supporters to the polling stations, particularly in this election.

"Getting 10 more ballots in a box,getting fivemore ballots in a box, getting 100 more ballots in a box, is everythinginthis kind of a closecampaign,and will determine who wins this campaign," he said.

That includes traditionaldoor-knocking as well as millions of phone calls, emails and texts to those identified as supporters.

"You're talking about sometimes five to 10 contacts per person on election day,"Lietaersaid.

Ground war

It really is the difference between the air war (the bombardment of political advertisements) and the ground war, saidRandiRahamim, a principal at theToronto-based communications firmNavigatorLtd.

"And many people believe it's all about the ground war," Rahamim said."The beginning of the campaign should be entirely spent on not only converting votes but identifying voters, identifying who your voter base is.So when it comes time to pull the votes, you know who you're pulling. You're pulling the right people to come out and vote."

Traditionally, in regardto voter identification, it's the Conservatives who have been most successful with their advanced contact data base, Rahamim said.But theLiberalsand NDP have since caught up.

"We'll be seeingorganizationsfocusing inonreallygetting thoselists together and gettingenoughvolunteersand having enough money to fund paid volunteers and real volunteers to go outthereandmobilize," Rahamim said.

Organizational web

But to pull it off on election day,Tielemansaid, you need hundreds of volunteers just in one riding. Perhapsmost important arethe scrutineerswho officially represent their respective partiesat polling stations. These scrutineers have access to the lists of names of people who have voted and are able to transmit that information back to the "zone house"the airtrafficcontrolof the riding.

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The level of organization needed to co-ordinate all those people isextraordinary, Tieleman said,let alone taking allthe data and translatingit in ordertoidentify whichsupporters need to be called, or have their door knocked on, or needa ride to apoll.

"This is agiantspider web oforganizationforeach party," he said."And if you have 500 volunteers and the other guy has 50, the party with 50 is severely disadvantaged. They can't possiblyknow who is voting and they can't possibly get all their votes out."

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This is why parties in recent years havepushed to gettheir supportersto vote in advancepolls.

"That's No. 1.Tryingtoget asmany resources off your table today so that you don't have to worry about making those phone calls on election day with the scarce resources you have," Lietaer said.

In this election theparties will be testing a host of get-out-the-vote digitaltools, he said.

"Lessof a 'Hey Bob,Iwillcome pickyou andgrannyup to vote.' It'll be less that, more Twitter, email,texts, electronic flyers, rather than voting cards on the doors to tell you where to vote."

And when it comes to getting out the vote, Lietaersaid you need to make an emotional connection with your supporters. "You're trying to get somebodyoff the couch, get them out of the house in the car to go andactually do something that you want them to do."

"Ambivalence and apathy are your enemies. Hope, fear,any sort of emotion is your friend. Sothat's whyyou're trying to make an emotional connection."