Political Fundraising

Every campaign rents the same lists. The unlock is not another file. It is knowing which of your donors and bundlers is one introduction away from a prospect who has not given yet, and who can make that introduction. A great bundler knows hundreds of people and can name twenty in a meeting. Meerkat shows the rest.

WHAT YOU GET ON DAY ONE

Your bundler roster mapped in days. Names are enough to start.

625M people in the graph

1.85B connections, each backed by a dated record

5 kinds of connection: worked together, same board, recommended by name, same street, same household

15–25% of prospects take a warm introduction, against about 2% who reply to a cold email

Every campaign rents the same list. The campaigns that win the next cycle will compete on the relationships underneath, the warm paths their bundlers can actually open, not the names on the page.

Mary Shea, PhD · Co-Founder & CGO · former Forrester Principal Analyst

CONTENTS

What's inside.

A short read on what changes when your donor file becomes a network. Written for finance directors, call-time managers, and the bundlers and consultants who have to hit a number.

01 The Reality · Same lists, same asks, the bundler's network hidden. 03

02 How We Know · Five kinds of connection. Every path shows its evidence. 04

03 The Ah-Ha · The names your bundler could not recall. 05

04 Where You Use It · Answers inside Claude, ChatGPT, Gemini and your CRM. 06

05 Get Started · Start with your bundler roster. 07

Relationships are the most powerful force in business and in life. The intelligence to understand them has always been there, scattered and out of reach. Meerkat brings it together, so every campaign can see the relationships it already has and put them to work.

Ralph Schonenbach · Founder & CEO, Meerkat

The Reality: Same list. The bundler's network is hidden.

Every campaign rents from the same vendors and ends up with the same names. By the third quarter, the reliable donors are tapped out and the call-time list is built on hope.

The unlock is not a bigger list. It is the warm path your own bundlers and donors already hold. Your CRM has names and a giving history. What it does not show is who your donors and bundlers know. A great bundler has a network of hundreds and can name twenty at any review. The other few hundred, the ones the finance director needs, stay hidden, and the bundler ask stays generic.

The bundler cannot see the network

A strong bundler knows hundreds of people and can recall a couple of dozen in a meeting. The rest are exactly who the campaign needs. Without a map, the ask is "who else do you know," and it produces a shrug.

The list is everyone's list

Every campaign rents from the same vendors, so the names repeat across the field. The prospect who would take the call because a trusted bundler asked is the one a rented file can never show.

Call time is wasted time

The candidate's most valuable hour gets burned on a call sheet of strangers, instead of warm asks routed through someone the prospect already trusts. The relationships that win a cycle are already inside the file and inside the bundler's network, hidden from every tool. Meerkat shows them, and turns the generic ask into a warm introduction.

Ralph Schonenbach · Founder & CEO, Meerkat

How We Know: Five kinds of connection. Every path shows its evidence.

Every connection Meerkat shows comes from a dated record, so you can see why two people know each other before you ask for the introduction. Paths are ranked by strength, strongest first.

WORKED TOGETHER

Both at Deloitte, 2014 to 2018 Twenty years of dated employment history, matched to the person across name and role changes. The former colleague, the industry peer, the professional network a bundler built over a career.

SAME BOARD

Same board since 2019 Corporate boards, advisory councils and foundation boards, with dates. The shared board seat that connects a bundler to a prospect who has not given yet.

RECOMMENDED BY NAME

Written recommendation on file Public profile recommendations, where one person has vouched for another by name. The strongest signal that an introduction will be welcome.

SAME STREET

Same street in Winnetka, eight years Licensed deed and assessor records in the United States. The in-district neighbor a donor can introduce.

SAME HOUSEHOLD

Same home address Adults who currently share an address, from household and address records. Adults only, current residence. Meerkat does not map family structure.

IN-DISTRICT

Know who lives where. Residence from licensed deed and assessor records, so you can see which prospects live in the district before you ask. Public records and licensed data. Nothing scraped, nothing pooled. Nobody else offers careers, boards, deeds and households together.

The Ah-Ha: The names your bundler could not recall.

The same file and the same candidate hour, run two ways. The difference is between dialing strangers and handing a bundler specific names from his own network that he could not recall in the room.

The bundler multiplier · the people he could not name

THE REALITY

Your top bundler is a partner at a major firm. He has hosted three events and tapped the same dozen colleagues each time. The finance director knows his network is far bigger, but he cannot recall, in a meeting, the other few hundred people he actually knows.

WITH MEERKAT

Meerkat maps every connection of every bundler and major donor on the roster. You hand him forty specific names from his own network, in-district and with no prior giving to the candidate, each a warm introduction he can actually make.

→ Specific names from the bundler's actual network, instead of a vague "who else do you know."

The warm path · from a cold call to a trusted ask

THE REALITY

The finance team works a rented list of prospects who have given to similar causes. Reply rates sit where cold outreach always does. The prospects who pick up have no relationship with the campaign.

WITH MEERKAT

Meerkat shows which prospects are one introduction away from a current donor or bundler, through a shared board, a former employer, or the same neighborhood, and who can open each door. Cold calls become warm asks.

→ Warm introductions a donor or bundler can make, instead of cold calls to rented names.

ILLUSTRATIVE EXAMPLES

2% reply to a cold email

15–25% take a warm introduction

1 specific name, from the right bundler's network, for the introduction

Where You Use It: Answers where you already work.

Meerkat is not another platform for your finance team to learn. Ask who can introduce you in Claude, ChatGPT or Gemini, or see it alongside your CRM. No new app to open.

BEFORE MEERKAT

WITH MEERKAT

Bundlers tap the same dozen people every event → Specific names from each bundler's full network

"Who else do you know?" gets a shrug → In-district names with a warm path attached

Cold outreach to rented prospect lists → Warm introductions through a donor or bundler

Warm paths live only in a bundler's memory → Every connection mapped, with how they know each other

Call sheets full of strangers → Call sheets that open with a mutual connection

AI assistants see one record at a time → Ask Claude who can introduce you, and get the path back

AI ASSISTANTS

Claude · ChatGPT · Gemini

CRM

Salesforce · HubSpot

YOUR OWN DATA

Add your donor file and bundler roster at no cost. They stay in your campaign's own workspace. The finance director asks Claude which bundlers can introduce the campaign to the in-district prospects it most wants to reach. The answer comes back in a sentence, with the path and the reason, not a research project.

Get Started: Start with your bundlers. Then add your donors.

The fastest way to see what Meerkat does is to point it at the people you already know. Send us your bundler roster. We send back the warm paths inside their networks, in time for next quarter.

STEP 01

Send us your roster.

Your bundlers and host committee. Names are enough. We do not need giving history or anything sensitive.

STEP 02

We map their networks.

Within days, every connection around each bundler, the prospects in those networks, and the introduction path to each. Add your donor file when you are ready. Imports are free.

STEP 03

Hand out the names.

Give each bundler specific names from their own network. Route cold prospects to the donor who can introduce them. Build call sheets that open warm. → One workspace per campaign. Nothing you load is visible to anyone else.

→ Public records and licensed data. Nothing scraped, nothing pooled. → Any individual can ask to be removed, and stays removed on every refresh. → Plans for campaigns, party committees and PACs.

FROM NAMES TO NETWORKS

Every bundler is a network. Now put it to work.

Tell us about your campaign. We will show you the warm paths already in it.

info@trymeerkat.ai · trymeerkat.ai