Case Study:
Tom Steyer for Governor
Nearly doubled the campaign’s active email list while building out new channels for voter persuasion and volunteer mobilization.
Results That Speak for Themselves
Jacobs Studio revived the Steyer campaign’s email and SMS program, driving massive reactivation of inactive audiences and driving new list growth at zero cost.*
*y-axis below altered to protect client data. While the raw numbers are different the proportions remain the same.
Our email program deviated from the standard paradigm of hair on fire manufactured emergency that we’ve come to expect from political campaign emails. As a result, we averaged 50% open rates and drove high levels of engagement across the board.
SMS
Most of our SMS subscribers found their way onto Tom’s list because of his previous work with NextGen Climate and Need to Impeach. That context meant we couldn’t assume they were Tom supporters. We had to win them over.
Taking a friendly, conversational approach drove an overall non-opt out reply rate of 27%. Our volunteer recruitment SMS campaigns had a response rate of 21%.
“Steve is a great addition to any campaign's digital team! He added valuable strategic leadership to the digital team, spearheaded successful new tactics that grew the campaign's audience at zero cost, and injected needed creativity and innovation into our digital get out the vote program. ”
— Heather Hargreaves, Campaign Manager
The Context
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Because Tom Steyer was a self-funded candidate and because email and SMS are primarily considered fundraising tools for political campaigns, the campaign had not sufficiently invested in those channels. The campaign had access to large email lists from Tom’s presidential run and his Need to Impeach campaign, but those lists were largely inactive.
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The Steyer campaign contracted Jacobs Studio to provide full-scale email support for the months of the primary, beginning in March of 2026. Our remit later expanded to include SMS, web content strategy, and digital volunteer mobilization.
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Email and SMS strategy, copywriting, and execution
Web content strategy
Digital volunteer mobilization
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Ballot chase initiatives. To drive ballot returns in a predominantly vote-by-mail state, we used a free sticker giveaway to collect physical mailing addresses to match back to the voter file. The tactic successfully drove list growth and voter contact — and was revenue positive thanks to a large proportion of participants opting to pay for their stickers.
Gentle persuasion. The bulk of our list had subscribed prior to Tom’s run for governor, so we treated the email and SMS programs as persuasion channels. With issue surveys and a warm, conversational tone, we drove engagement and persuaded voters to join Team Tom.