Last night I spoke with a small group of conservative activists at the Leadership Institute about some of the emerging technologies and tips I offer with regard to fundraising online.

Via my SlideShare account, you can see (and download) my presentation:

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Of course, a presentation is only as good as its presenter, and since most of the slides in my deck offer little text, I'll elaborate.

I kicked off the discussion by noting that the Internet has done one major thing, "helped us communicate more effectively with real, live people -- 'smarter, better, faster, NOW.'" We no longer have to wait for checks to be written by our supporter and mailed to our campaign -- instead, we're seeing a trend of folks who are giving donations online.

I use the example of Barack Obama as the latest evidence of this shift from offline giving to online giving. I site Barack's online fundraising numbers that have been reported well by Patrick Ruffini.

With regard to how Democrats have been able to amass so much treasure from previously unturned stones, I always use a personal example to help relate what I call the Long Tail of Fundraising.

Now that the stage is set, I talk about the Left's ActBlue and how Slatecard has helped provide a similar utility for the Right. I then talk about some of the tools that I believe will change the online fundraising space forever like Slatecard's proprietary innovation, Donor Analytics, and our deployment of anywhere fundraising widgets and facebook applications (still in private beta) to help drive donations in popular watering holes.

I conclude by offering four quick and easy tips to help better embrace online supporters.

1. Capture Emails at Every Possible Turn. Use a splash page before folks enter your website to make your supporters make a choice -- join your team or don't -- but the choice must be made before entering a website.

2. Ask for Realistic Gifts. Ask your online community for $25, $50 or $100. Your community will give you what they can afford but the folks that will give you low-dollar amounts online will likely give more to you over time. The point is to lower the barrier of entry and build your donor base.

3. DonationTubes. Have your principle/candidate make the final "ask" via video embedded directly to your secure donation page. Read this blog post for a more thorough answer.

4. Thank Your Supporters. It's hard to believe, but some politicians (and I know from personal experience) do not thank their online supporters. As an example of how to properly thank your supporters, I relate the fact that I received a personal note from Senator Tom Coburn when I contributed a mere $20 to his campaign through Slatecard. The benefit of him taking the time to personally recognize my donation is that, well, here I am blogging about it and I told a room of 30 conservative activists about it last night. In other words, treat every donor on an equal playing field and it will likely yield a great ROI.

The bottom-line with regard to online fundraising is that there's no silver bullet. I can't tell you how to mirror what Ron Paul did or what Barack Obama is doing. But we can keep an eye on the space and help relate what works and what doesn't.

[Cross-Posted at the Slatecard Blog.]