One MKE
Case Study
Market Strategy
Engagement Consulting
Experience Design
How we made NEW possible
NEWaukee acted as the lead agency-of-record to manage all aspects of One MKE, a non-partisan initiative to deepen relationships with Milwaukee residents, address their needs, and cultivate a culture of proactive civic engagement throughout the city.
How it connected
Between June 19th and November 5th, 2024, NEWaukee’s stewardship of One MKE outreach led to over 118,000 engagements with Milwaukee residents on the importance of voter participation.
In the 2024 US presidential election, Milwaukee’s turnout among registered voters increased to 85% from 78.5% in 2020. The number of votes cast grew by 560 votes, despite the total population falling by about 15,800 between 2020 and 2023. These results are in stark contrast to other similar-sized metros, like Detroit, which continued to see decreases in turnout.
Increasing resident engagement through innovative activations & site-based outreach
Engagement Challenge
The cornerstone of a well-functioning democracy lies in active civic participation. Wisconsin voting-age residents consistently turn out at or above 70%; however, the City of Milwaukee has witnessed a decline in civic participation. In 2012, Milwaukee lagged behind the state turnout by three percentage points; over the years, that gap expanded to seventeen percentage points in 2020.
In September 2023, Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson issued an executive order instructing his cabinet members to determine how their agencies can increase civic engagement.
Engagement Solution
Out of Mayor Johnson’s directive came One MKE, an innovative partnership between the City of Milwaukee, the Milwaukee Public Library, Cities Forward, NEWaukee, and local community partners to deepen relationships with residents, address their needs, and cultivate a culture of proactive civic engagement throughout the city.
NEWaukee acted as the lead agency-of-record to manage all aspects of the project, including:
Designing the One MKE brand identity and all supplemental design materials
Building and maintaining the OneMKE.org website
Hiring and managing a team of 20+ community outreach coordinators to connect with residents 1:1 in the community
Coordinating influencer outreach and marketing campaigns
Regularly communicating with One MKE partners and coalition members, including Pizza to the Polls and Purple Tour
Producing content for social media and managing paid social media campaigns
Planning and executing sponsorships and activations at community events
Creating dashboards for metrics and reporting on progress weekly
Key Insights
NEWaukee was approached by Cities Forward and the City of Milwaukee to support the One MKE project as an agency-of-record. Key insights out of initial meetings included the following:
Planned initiatives should help to re-build trust with residents that the City is working for them.
Activities by One MKE, both in-person and online, needed to reach wards that are experiencing the most severe decreases in voter participation.
Due to the importance of building 1:1 relationships with residents, we needed to quickly grow our team of community outreach coordinators.
THE
RESULTS
8.4M
Online Campaign Impressions
6,245
Pledge to Vote Postcards Collected
160.6K
Residents Reached through One MKE Mail Inserts
Total Resident Engagements
(Site-Based Outreach, Text Messages, etc.)
