The controversy over MoveOn's General Betray Us ad reminds us that the best online strategy is still about getting the basics right. In this case: tapping into the visceral reaction to an event within the first 12-24 hours and inviting your supporters to participate to respond in ways that count. And you'll primarily use the most unglamorous, Web 1.0 club in the bag: e-mail.

An outrage like General Betray Us doesn't come along very often when you're the party in power. So I was pretty disappointed when, in the maelstrom that unfolded on Monday, the Republican candidates for President chose to respond by press release, rather than by writing a personal note of disgust to their email list. By sending a well-crafted email, not only could the candidate have gotten his initial response across to a larger audience (the essential principle of "Big Seed Marketing") but he could have more effectively stayed in the news cycle with an action item he could follow up on over the next couple of days. Most reporters are on your email list, so they won't miss it if you break news through the medium. And for those that aren't, you follow up with a press release announcing the email. This is basic blocking and tackling.

Of all the major GOP players, only the Republican National Committee -- my old stomping ground -- used the medium to respond in a timely manner, sending an appeal for money out on Monday night. While I expect that this email and others like it did quite well, I think the opportunity to list-build was even greater. Fundraising is generally a one-off. The people you sign up using a petition or who co-sign a letter stay with you for an entire campaign -- and beyond.

The key to being effective in this operational window is building an action item with actual news value. And it could have been as basic as asking your supporters to sign on to a letter to Hillary Clinton asking her to denounce the MoveOn ad. When she doesn't -- you get to send another email telling people she's ignored the voice of the people and asking people to take further action, like donating to defeat Hillary Clinton, or doing letters to the editor, or emailing Pinch Sulzberger about the New York Times' "family discount." Either way, the candidates would have gotten an automatic story out of this.

The one candidate who fundraised effectively off the controversy was Rudy Giuliani, who devised his own New York Times ad using MoveOn's dramatic discount as a hook to re-enter the discussion. Rudy engaged the medium effectively by asking people to participate in his response, rather than just donating to fight the generic MoveOn/Hillary bogeyman. Now, I don't quite get how spending $181,000, or $167,000, or even $65,000 on one page of newsprint is cost-effective -- unless your message is explosive like MoveOn's -- but if there is anything this has controversy has shown, it's that a spread in the Times still has a certain aura about it.

Still, I was hoping the Republican candidates would use this moment as an opportunity to dramatically beef up their email lists by signing up tens of thousands of outraged conservatives.

The Heritage Foundation has graciously posted the video of last week's Modern Media Strategies workshop in Washington. For those of you who missed it or couldn't make it to D.C., I'm reposting the video of my presentation with Romney 2008's Mindy Finn on how to build and activate a mass movement using e-mail. Here is the accompanying slideshow.

I hope you find it useful. Please let me know if in the comments if this presentation (or any of the ones last week) caused you to make a change in your online strategy, or even in how you look at the online world. Now that we've reached 160 eager young conservatives in person -- and hundreds more by posting these videos -- we're hopeful that this will have a real world impact in the strategies conservatives are using to reach their core audience.

Fred Thompson announced via e-mail tonight that he will announce his run for President on Thursday, September 6th. While the timing of his e-mail was awful (received at 6:42 pm Central), the content is terrific.

There are a few observations that come to mind though:

1. True to Thompson's grassroots, populist form, the campaign does not include a single donation link in this e-mail. Some might question the wisdom of that, but Fred came into being as a Presidential candidate with the support of grassroots activists. It's a very smart move. The campaign knows their audience here and know that they'll make a ton more money off a house party plan than a standard "donate now" link. (They did not neglect, however, to put a bubble on the side with a big red "Contribute" button but it's placement is appropriate.)

2. The e-mail is addressed to "Dear Friends" not "Dear Allen." That's a crucial mistake, especially when I know they have my name on file - I gave it to them when I signed up for their e-mails! As I've said before, e-mail is about building a relationship. I don't have a warm, friendly relationship with people who call me "Friends." Technically, this is easy. Someone just dropped the ball.

3. Fred Thompson will launch a legitimate campaign for President via webcast. That's just unreal. Sure, Hillary and Edwards and all them did it months ago, but that was months ago when there was no pressure and relatively little media attention. I'm as much of a new media guy as anyone, and I applaud them for going for it, but this is risky at best. Friends of Fred Thompson will not get nearly the attention from the mainstream media as a big event on the square in Lawrenceburg, Tenn. would. On the other hand, this does play to his strength. He is a professional TV actor after all. I'd imagine they will allow networks to play the broadcast-quality video live as well. Either way it is a go-for-broke strategy and I'm interested to see how it plays out.

4. As good as this e-mail is and as much as it will stir up support, conceptually they're light years behind what Mitt Romney is doing - namely, (as Patrick Ruffini pointed out earlier today) hosting a contest giving supporters the tools to create an ad online that will be aired via broadcast. I have no doubt, however, that they have some interesting, strategic, focused plans up their sleeves.

An image of the e-mail can be viewed here.

The text of the e-mail is below:

Dear Friends,

On September 6, 2007, Fred Thompson will be announcing his intention to run for President of the United States with a webcast available to millions at www.imwithfred.com. The launch of the video will be followed by a five-day campaign tour through Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. On the evening of the 6th, there will also be a National House Party, during which there will be a conference call with Fred.

We enter this campaign in a strong position. Fred is consistently near the top in the polls, and conservatives across the country have put together the closest thing to a draft in recent presidential campaign history in an effort to bring about this day. The next few weeks will only serve to build upon those efforts, with house parties, visits to the early primary states, and a homecoming in Lawrenceburg, TN on the 15th. To view the dates and locations of Fred's bus tour, please click here, and check back soon for more information on attending one of these events.

By announcing via webcast, Fred is able to take his consistently mainstream conservative message directly to the voters, who are already responding to that message with a strong upwelling of grassroots support. The webcast and the following campaign tour will play to Fred’s strengths, a consistent record of conservatism, his ability to clearly spread his message, and his ability to work with and connect with Americans from all walks of life. Be apart of this historic occasion by signing up to host or attend a house party today.

Sincerely,

Bill LacyManager, Friends of Fred Thompson, Inc.

When David, Rob, Soren, and I started kicking around an idea for an online training for conservatives, we maybe expected 50 people would show up to an all-day event in a sleepy August in D.C. when the city practically shuts down.

In light of that, the turnout at Heritage today rocked. More than 150 young conservatives showed up, many from out of town, ready to take the fight directly to the left.

More than anything, it was a great meeting of the minds, and my head is just awash in new ideas from all comers. It was also amazed me to see how many people are really following TechRepublican and instinctively buy in to the narrative about technology and the future of the party that we are building collectively. And that's not just online professionals. These are the people who will be running the campaigns and major nonprofits 5, 10, 15 years down the line.

With the success of the Save the Debate coalition, the emerging competition to ActBlue, and real efforts to churn out more online operatives kicking into high gear, I think we'll look back and say that this is the summer it started to happen.

My panel was about the boring, stodgy topic of email campaigns and how to build a mass movement on the Internet. It's something I don't thing gets enough attention with the current laser-like focus on social media (which is definitely emerging). I co-presented with my friend and former colleague Mindy Finn of Romney for President, who followed up with a case study of the campaign's enormously successful Sign Up America! campaign.

My slideshow is below. Consider this a teaser. You'll need to hear me speak for it actually make sense -- or so I hope!

Last night, I got an email from John McCain filled with typical political happy talk like "Though we have a long, hard road ahead of all of us, I know that with your help, we will prevail," and "Together, I have every confidence that we will be successful."

I certainly don't feel any outsized affection for Senator McCain, but I sincerely believe he missed an opportunity to make history. To really engage his supporters in a valiant comeback attempt, to give them ownership of the campaign, and to maybe -- just maybe -- set in motion some momentum that could have gotten him back in this. It's a strategy that will take guts -- a willingness to publicly put the very survival of the campaign on the line (as though it isn't already).

Here's the email McCain could have sent (after the jump):

When critics point to the Republican Party's problems online, my response is that our problems aren't online. Our problems are offline, in a cranky base, in a reluctance to truly motivate and inspire cause-oriented Republican voters, and in the fact that we are in power in the midst of an unpopular war. Many of these apparent problems go away or get a lot better once we unify against Hillary as the nominee. If this were simply a contest of Web sites and technology -- GeorgeWBush.com vs. JohnKerry.com in 2004, GOP.com vs. Democrats.org, Voter Vault vs. Demzilla, microtargeting vs. what exactly? -- Republicans would win hands down.

Or at least, that seems to have been the case until now.

I've worked with enough of the developers and tech visionaries on the Republican side to know that the talent to build great online experiences, ones that connect you directly with your voters, exists in abundance. But recently, this approach has lost ground to a theory that the best way to communicate with your base is through third parties like bloggers and social networks. That means Republicans are far out front on things like blogger conference calls, hashing out legislation on Red State, and Twittering. And they're quietly losing ground on the basics of online campaigning: e-mail lists, Web development, and video.