Aristotle’s credo is that innovation drives progress, especially when it disrupts the status quo. Two decades ago, Aristotle played a pioneering role in the invention of online political fundraising—a revolution that upended the traditional shadowy means of raising money for campaigns.
Aristotle is again upending the political world with an innovation that has been four years in the making. Stemming from collaborating with Square™, a mobile credit card processor, during the 2012 presidential election, the company sought to build on the capabilities of Square™ to develop a mobile solution specifically designed for political fundraising. As a result, fundraising is again the target of Aristotle engineers, who have brought the power of data mining to mobile campaigns in what we have coined the Aristotle Mobile Processor or ‘AMP’.
Why AMP, Why Aristotle
Imagine a candidate at the county fair wading through the crowd greeting supporters, fielding questions and compliments and offers of support from supporters. Instead of referring supporters to a website for donations, why not enable them to donate on the spot?
Or, while at a PAC or party rally, attendees moved to donate may do so by passing around an AMP-equipped mobile phone or tablet, much like the church deacons pass the tray for donations from the faithful.
Aristotle is uniquely positioned to fill the void between an increasingly mobile society and the political process. We have a long history of accepting credit cards, and we have an entire team of experts devoted to ensuring all products and services are compliant. Consequently, people in the industry trust Aristotle with their data and processing, which allows both campaigns and PACs to maximize their fundraising potential. Unlike Square™, AMP collects all the information you need, such as employer and occupation for your FEC and FPPC reports. Moreover, AMP instantly references millions of prior contributions, and suggests an amount to ask of the donor.
In our experience, AMP is the only mobile credit card contribution processor that adequately captures all the contributor information required for regulatory disclosure.
– Mathew Deane, Dean & Company
AMP is more than simply processing credit cards. It’s allowing political organizations to take credit cards in a safe and compliant manner anytime, anywhere–from a campaign rally to a coffee shop to a campaign’s headquarters. While websites remain an important avenue for donations, they aren’t a point-of-sale tool when in the field. Time-consuming and costly credit card terminals are an outdated, cumbersome thing of the past.
AMP is the best technology to come into the political fundraising world since… well, ever. I love how easy it is, and how seamlessly it works with the rest of the Aristotle solution. Now I can spend more time raising money and less time manually entering check information or correcting incorrect check information into my database. It’s great!
– Alex Grant, National Association of Broadcasters
The Future of Fundraising
Aristotle foresees the future of campaign fundraising being a combination of clean data and dedication to streamlining the political process by way of technology. In the past, too many potential contributions were deemed invalid due to incomplete data. AMP simplifies the donation process by ensuring one’s fundraising efforts are maximized.
