【Loyalty Test (2024) Hindi Web Series】

The Loyalty Test (2024) Hindi Web SeriesTrump campaign, the Brexit "Leave" campaign, the National Rifle Association and pro-life Catholics all have at least one thing in common: Their apps.

Behind many of the apps of the conservative movement is one company, uCampaign.

uCampaign burst onto the Republican tech scene when it developed an app for Ted Cruz during the early days of the Republican presidential primary race last year. Cruz gained some buzz for using technology to fundraise and send voting reminders amid a not-so-digitally inclined GOP field.

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Since then, the company has pitched itself to conservative candidates and interest groups as a developer that understands their values — unlike those other left-leaning tech companies.

It's a reality that Thomas Peters, founder of uCampaign, doesn't try to hide.

"We're a center-right company," Peters told Mashable. "It's easier to do things like work with the Republican nominee."

uCampaign launched in 2014 with a self-titled app that allows any (conservative) organization to build a campaign page for political organizing. Since then, the company has developed 18 custom iOS/Android apps for conservative groups. More recently, the company built Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump's "America First" app, along with apps for the NRA, a number of conservative Catholic groups, an anti-marriage equality organization in Australia and the "Vote Leave" Brexit campaign.

The Virginia-based company, which operates under the legal name Political Social Media LLC, even built an app for Dominican Republic President Danilo Medina's re-election campaign.

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

But from the company's own materials, it might be hard to glean its value system. The name "uCampaign" doesn't suggest an ideology, and the company's descriptions cover only "politics and activism" without noting a particular brand of either. Only on the company website's "featured clients" section does a visitor get a hint of the common thread between uCampaign's work.

Peters founded uCampaign, however, with the express goal of improving conservatives' digital presence. The company's conservative alliances grew out of Peters' own work as a conservative Catholic blogger under the name American Papist.

"On the right in general, our digital side lags," Peters said.

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President Barack Obama's campaign famously harnessed the power of digital advocacy to turn out the youth vote in 2008. Peters, now 31, was spurred to action after Republican Mitt Romney's loss in 2012, when he saw conservative friends griping on Facebook but failing to use the social network to organize.

SEE ALSO: How an app can make volunteering for a presidential campaign easier than ever

Groups like NGP Van and Blue State Digital, a progressive digital agency that has drawn many Obama campaign alums, offer similar digital services to liberal candidates and causes.

"There's a long history of companies that serve just exclusively Democratic campaigns and causes," Blue State Digital Technical Director Mike Conlow, a 2012 Obama veteran, told Mashable.

Those agencies generally offer a wide range of digital services, whereas uCampaign is staying focused on its singular app platform.

Indeed, for all uCampaign's success in snagging high-profile conservative clients, it's still not as sophisticated as the Democratic side of things.

All of uCampaigns apps have the same format. The home pages — whether for Trump or the NRA — show an action page and news feed with options for checking in at political events, calling a representative, watching a campaign video or connecting with other supporters.

The feed is fairly simple across uCampaign's apps. It's mainly full of text and doesn't really use many photos, videos or gifs. Peters talks about the appeal of gamification for political campaigns, but the "game" in this case is mainly collecting points and tracking progress, not swiping or playing a game in a more interactive way.

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

And if you search "America First" in the iOS app store, Trump's app is only the second option, behind the America First Credit Union. The Trump campaign only began publicizing its app in late August.

Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton's app, by contrast, is a bona fide game that asks users to build and navigate their own campaign headquarters, while earning more features through actions like "commit to vote" and "invite a friend."

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

uCampaign builds a backend that campaign or organization staff can use to update the appearance and text of their own apps. The company is responsible for keeping the apps up and running on the engineering side of things with its team of four people.

The simple presentation is, to a point, intentional, Peters says. Peters and his clients know that any conservative app needs to be accessible to older users.

In Trump's app, for example, 35 percent of users are ages 45 to 60 and 15 percent are over 60. Across uCampaign's apps, users skew male.

Its Brexit app was downloaded 30,000 times in the three weeks leading up to the UK referendum. And the company credited itself with helping Cruz win Iowa back in February.

uCampaign hasn't raised any funding in its two years, Peters said. The company is focused right now on the race to Election Day. Even its advocacy apps seem to be all election all the time, with reminders to vote for Trump overwhelming the NRA's app page.

After November 8, Peters says he's looking forward to working more with the Republican National Committee, which could provide the opportunity for growth.

"No matter how large or how small your outfit, as long as your candidate or group has supporters and a good mission," Peters wrote in a blog post after Cruz's Iowa win," "uCampaign has a solution to turn your supporters into effective activists."

Topics Apps & Software Donald Trump Elections

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