Complete Voter File
Although Campaign Data usually assumes the responsibility of managing the data for a campaign by creating walk lists, phone lists, mail files, etc., there are times when you, the candidate, may want to handle the voter file yourself because you have a friend, family member or someone on your staff who is familiar with database management.
When you enlist Campaign Data's services, your primary option is to purchase the Campaign Package which includes processing the voter file for your district. After file processing, you may take possession of the file itself, or you can opt to purchase campaign related products such as walk lists, mail files, or call lists at a discount. The second option is to purchase individual products on an as-needed basis.
Note that the demographics package is free with the processed voter file. Please review the purchasing plans located on the pricing page.File Schema (File Format)
The voter file will contains all the fields we use at Campaign Data to create 98% of the campaign products we offer, but, unless you, or someone you know, has the necessary database programming skills, it will be difficult to duplicate our products.
The following download describes the various fields usually included in our file:
Telephone Number Appends
Telephone numbers are only included with the voter file if you request that telephone appending be done on a cost/1000 basis. Our web site has an extensive explanation of the telephone appending process managed by Campaign Data and you should review this option on the page entitled Telephone Appends before requesting that telephone numbers be added to your voter file.
As usual, give us a call regarding this option if you still have questions after reviewing the telephone append page.
Voting History Fields
Campaign Data uses a quality ranking that does not require listing individual voting dates as separate fields indicating whether or not a voter voted on that date. Please read our "White Paper" entitled Who Votes in order to understand Campaign Data's quality ranking system and how we determine likely or frequent voters.
In some cases, especially local elections, we will need your input in order to choose the best dates. Be advised, however, there are no magic dates. Almost any five dates that are not all general elections, will provide the same results in terms of identifying the voters who will turn out to vote in your election.
We can add actual voting dates to a voter file and populate these fields, but there is an additional charge of $10 per date because, again, this is not the way our data was intended to be used.
Data Transfer Formats
Available data formats:
- Microsoft® Excel®
- Comma or Tab Delimited Text
- DBF
I regularly produce the voter file in either Excel™ or tab-delimited text. Please remember that Excel has a 64,000 record limitation, therefore many larger districts will not work in Excel.
Optional data format conversions for a small service fee:
- Microsoft® Access®
- Microsoft® SQL Server® (as backup file or "detached database")
Delivery Options
For smaller districts, a zipped file by email generally works well.
For large data file downloads, we will create a personalized client FTP site for your campaign with a username and password.
The last option for delivery would be to mail the data to you on a CD.
Limitations on Voter File Purchase
We do not sell voter data for commercial or non-campaign related purposes.
We do not knowingly sell data files to data processing competitors, but there are exceptions. Call us with questions.
Unless we are retained by a specific state-wide campaign, we do not sell the data set for the entire State of Florida.
We do sell the voter file on a county-wide basis
Obviously, there are exceptions, and we will entertain any proposal from an independent data processing consultant.
Important Legal Notice
Under Florida law, no portion of data purchased for one campaign can be used free of charge by any other campaign. Co-mingling of funds is illegal, so please do not put yourself or Campaign Data in an awkward legal position by trying to help out a fellow candidate.
Municipal Voter Files
Not every county Supervisor of Elections adequately identifies municipal precincts on their web sites or in their data. Occasionally, Campaign Data will require your assistance in identifying municipal precincts if you are in a municipal race. Individual municipalities have been given the responsibility of identifying their own precincts for candidates and voters alike. This also can apply to voter history data.