It is being called the most successful campaign in US history. Despite going on for nearly two years, it never flagged. It pitchforked a
relatively unknown junior senator to the White House. And it cost over half a billion dollars. So, what was the mechanics — the nuts and bolts — of Barack Obama's campaign? The biggest innovation made by Obama's campaign managers was the use of latest internet based technologies and online-offline flipping. This is how it worked: right after Obama announced his candidature in early 2007, this went into a huge databank. These people received regular news, campaign messages and updates from the headquarters.The campaign managers, under direct orders from Obama himself, flipped it around and merged this online community with traditional door-knocking. For example, on one Sunday in June this year, the whole network was asked to go out and meet the neighbors. Suddenly, the country was flooded with campaigners. The community got so big that the campaign managers decided to refine it further. They floated a social networking site called MyBo, with half a million members and 8,000 affinity groups.
