Hi Mr. Fundraiser,

Thanks for inviting me to Mr. Candidate's fundraising event, but for now I have to decline. I am sure this is not going to be the only fundraiser for him, so please keep me in mind for future events.

I actually met Mr. Candidate at a "New Democrat Movement" event and have given him the thumbs up among different bloggers here in NYC. We have discussed even the possibility of using BlogPac; and as a member of the ImpeachPACs steering committee, I've tossed his name around.

That's why I am writing this post.

You see, I am more useful to you as an evangelizer for candidates like Mr. Candidate than as a donor.

The threshold for impacting politics has been lowered dramatically by the appearance of blogs in the media landscape. It does not mean there is no cost to it. It takes a lot of work, marketing and talent to do a good blog. But what it means is that bloggers and blogs are a whole different kind of resource. Blogs are not effective because they accelerate the spread of just content, information, data. They are effective because they can rapidly build or flatline reputations.

An effective blog community is not a noise machine. An effective blog community is a reputation engine.

That's why it is not enough for me to blog about Mr. Candidate and ask my community of readers to give him money. You need to prove to us you are one of us. You need to show us you share in on our social values and political principles.

Landing in blogs here and there and asking for money is not enough. Being part of the communities we are building, that is part of the key of reaching out beyond the geographical boundaries of Mr. Candidate's Congressional District or your fundraising events. Either you as a fundraiser or the candidate themselves have to be part of my communities at The Daily Gotham and culturekitchen in order for people to understand or "get" why he is worthy of a donation.

I have seen that Mr. Candidate has been diaring at one of the Big National Blogs to raise his visibility in the blogosphere. I have said to him and his staff that coming to NY-centric community blogs is probably one of the most important steps he needs to take.

In my case, I am a blogger's blogger and that is where most of my sphere of influence extends to. Traffic statistics are not the only way to look at a blog's influence. You have to look at the bloggers and publishers of those blogs to understand their reach.

Even though I think Big National Blog is a good start, I can't honestly say there are too many grassroots activist New Yorkers coming out of those blogs and jumping into action. Ask anybody at the several grassroots clubs and organizations here in New York City if there were throngs of New Yorkers coming out of the Big National Blog eager to work phone banks or hit the pavement for candidates. They will tell you they can count with one hand the amount of people who came out of those blogs.

Why you may ask? National community blogs are reputation engines. Local community blogs act more like conductors of political action. They are not either or propositions. You need both.

Big National Blog is a blog read by Washington insiders. That's why it's a good start for Mr. Candidate since it may gain Mr. Candidate visibility among the Washington crowd. To get people moved and eager to hit the pavement for him and move the grassroots? You need to go local. I tell you what Mr. Fundraiser, Mr. Candidate needs to focus on cross-posting on more New York political community blogs like this here blog.

But let me get back to you Mr. Fundraiser.

We need to talk.

You need to get out more into the blogosphere. How you decide to engage as a political fundraiser, that is of your own making. What I would like to communicate in the most ... ahem ... gentle way I can is that you can't treat this as regular media or even regular internet media. Blogs are about community, about involvement and ultimately about action.

The #1 mistake advertisers, marketers, political strategists and fundraisers make when hitting the blogosphere is to think of bloggers and readers as just consumers.

We are a new economy. An economy being built on a currency of interactivity, trust and reputation. This is not a consumer economy; it's a creative economy. Still in its infancy but the matrix, the core is there.

People gravitate to political blogs because they are view not as just publication but as politics in action. When was the last time you could have your comments of a newspaper article printed on the paper and ciruclated among all readers? Never. On a blog though you can comment on a post and that automatically adds you to the larger discussion. Blogs, diaries, comments, they augment us. Little itsy bitsy tech details like the ability to leave comments on a blog post is revolutionary. For the first time in generations, citizens have a way to effect politics by augmenting with their voice and their opinions a larger political discussion. People feel they are doing something; that they are not just watching passively and impotently.

With interactivity, blogs are not about consuming information, they are about enhancing it, augmenting it and ultimately changing it.

You and I know that comments on a blog are a very small part of actual political action. There are thousands of details and tasks that need to be attended to in politics and they mostly require money and people. But I want to stress how different this world of politics is online.

To understand how the new economy of blogs works you need to be a creator, an investor and a worker. You need to get down and dirty here and work to make us part of your efforts.

It's something to remember next time you invite me to one of your events; which I do hope to attend in the future.

Thanks again for the invite and good luck with your event.

In Peace and Prosperity,
Liza Sabater, Publisher
http://www.culturekitchen.com
http://www.dailygotham.com