RNC beefs up digital operations ahead of 2016

The Republican National Committee announced Monday it’s making staff changes to ramp up digital operations in hopes of building on its 2014 midterm successes heading into the presidential election year.

The RNC promoted from within to tap a chief data officer, chief technology officer and two senior advisers in an effort to bolster up its data and technology campaign operations.

{mosads}“For the first time the RNC completely integrated our digital, data and technology capabilities to help us identify voters, volunteers and donors with great success in the 2014 midterm cycle,” Chairman Reince Priebus said in a statement. “We built the first engineering and data science team that created voter scores, the API and important voter contact applications and our online marketing teams set records. As we begin our road to the White House there are going to be new and bigger demands on our digital, data and technology teams.”

Jesse Kamzol, formerly the RNC’s deputy data director, will serve as chief data officer responsible for voter analytics and the digital ground game.

Azarias Reda was formerly the chief data officer, and will now serve as chief technology officer, with a focus on new apps and other mobile technology.

The GOP’s underperformance in 2012 brought into focus the Democrats’ advantages with technology. Priebus made that issue a focus for the party in 2014 and turned things around. Republicans won their largest majority in the House since World War II and gained a majority in the Senate.