Crowdsourcing Obama’s Donations
by Patrick Ruffini :: February 20th, 2008 12:02 am Barack Obama won the Wisconsin primary tonight, cementing his status as the likely Democratic nominee. He now has a chance to wrap it up on March 4th.
For a while I’ve been mentally keeping tabs on Obama’s online fundraising numbers via the live count of the number of donors on his web site. However, it’s no RonPaulGraphs.com, with its deep analytics probing daily donation activity.
So, I’ve decided to crowdsource my monitoring of Obama’s website. Through a nifty new feature in Google Docs and Spreadsheets, I can now collect input for spreadsheets via a form. I’m asking folks to take the two bits of information (number of donors and time) and plug it into this form. This will take less than 30 seconds. You’re free to help out with this monitoring project more than once a day.
The spreadsheet with the latest numbers is here. I’ve added calculations for what they are on pace to do in a day using their number of donors and assuming a $120 online contribution average.
Tagged: barack obama 
crowdsourcing online politics
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Hi Ryan M,
It is because of the ‘crowdsourcing’ that Obama has managed to amass huge funds. And you are right : “Had Hillary won Wisconsin, this race would be flipped upside down.”
Sean
Good analysis. I’m willing to bet that Obama is already over the $50 million mark. Recognize that it is not just new donors who are bringing the money to the table - it is also the repeat donors. Given that the donor base is growing, one can safely assume that the $$$ brought in, as indicated by new donors, might also expand. (it depends on the rate at which people become repeat donors) $142 per new donor for last month actually represents some amount from the new donor, probably somewhat less than $142, added to that follow-on donations by repeat donors which added together, equals $142 per new donor.
If we assume that repeat donors continue to give, and that some January donors become repeat donors, then it is safe to assume $140 per new donor. At some point, there is probably some diminishing returns, but all signs point to this being another record breaking month.
This is exactly why I believe Wisconsin, of all states, may have proven to be Decisive. Had Hillary won Wisconsin, this race would be flipped upside down. I am simply amazed that she did not compete there. Wisconsin ensured she would struggle financially, and guaranteed Obama another solid return on his investment.
However, I do not think the pace of donations will be as strong given that there are no more contests for Barack to win. However, I expect one last surge prior to the next debate when the Campaign will surely announce they have crossed the 1,000,000 donor mark.
Last item. Is it possible for Barack Obama to get 500,000 new donors in February? Probably not, but the trend would have suggested roughly 465K new donors. Problem is - February is a short month.