Creating structure from ambiguity

Campaign Strategy · Public Affairs · Strategic Operations

A smiling man named Dom Lowell is looking at the camera. He has short dark hair and a beard, wearing a cream-colored jacket over an orange shirt, sitting on a blue tufted velvet couch in a wood-paneled room with large windows.
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I’m a campaign strategist and operations leader with 18 years of experience across advocacy, philanthropy, and civic technology. I help leaders set direction, bring people together, and turn complex priorities into campaigns and organizational plans that deliver.

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How I approach the work

The work often starts with a question: Where should we go next? How do we get this campaign off the ground? What will help people understand — and support — what we’re trying to do?

I help leaders work through those questions, drawing on research, listening to the people involved, and making sense of competing priorities. Then I help turn that direction into a plan and bring the right people together to carry it through.

Here’s what that has looked like across campaigns, organizations, and partnerships.


Campaigns. Organizations. Partnerships.

Selected work

Human Rights Campaign

Reality Flag

Bringing a stalled national advocacy campaign to launch

HRC’s Chief Marketing Officer brought me in to get a stalled $2M+ Equality Act campaign back on track. I rebuilt the budget, scope, timelines, and reporting across four WPP agencies and HRC’s internal teams, helping launch the campaign within 10 weeks.

The campaign generated 480M+ earned-media impressions and mobilized constituents to contact 96 of 100 U.S. senators. It was also shortlisted for a 2022 Cannes Lion in Outdoor.

  • The campaign’s $2M+ value included in-kind contributions. Getting it to launch required coordinating creative development, production, legal and policy review, paid media, and press activity across HRC and four WPP agencies.

    I rebuilt the working plan and reporting so teams could see what needed a decision, what depended on other work, and where delays threatened the launch.

    Alongside its reach and constituent engagement, the campaign reported a 3,200% increase in advocacy-site traffic. It won a 2023 Gold Health Clio and the 2022 Drum Award for Most Effective Integrated Marketing Campaign, in addition to its Cannes Outdoor shortlist recognition.

A woman in glasses holds an American flag outdoors, with trees and a boat in the background. There are only 29 stars on the flag signifying the many states where LGBTQ+ Americans lack basic protections.

Rock the Vote

Civic technology

Using civic technology to engage voters

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As a senior advisor to Rock the Vote, I help executive leadership and teams across its civic technology portfolio set priorities, navigate implementation challenges, and connect technology decisions to voter engagement and partner needs. To date, the platform has helped over 14 million voters.

I also lead government partnerships for Connected Voter Registration, managing existing state relationships and integrations while pursuing adoption in additional states — assessing technical feasibility, procurement requirements, regulatory barriers, and stakeholder readiness.

  • My role spans ongoing executive advising and specific initiatives across the civic technology portfolio. For the recent rollout of Rock the Vote’s rebuilt platform, I developed the communications plan, wrote the partner-facing website copy, and created the emails introducing the tools to partners.

    For Connected Voter Registration, I work with election officials and technical teams on live integrations in Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Washington. I developed government-facing positioning, security and implementation guides, and state case studies to help officials assess adoption and understand the process.

    The connected registration tools allow eligible voters to complete registration within Rock the Vote’s platform, without paper forms or follow-up.

Cruise Lines International Association

Executive strategy

Clarifying an industry association’s value and direction

Diagram of a simplified electrical circuit showing a power source connected to a load with a switch in the off position.

CLIA’s newly appointed CEO brought me in to translate a listening tour with cruise-line CEOs and owners into a strategic vision for the association. I combined their input with industry analysis and financial context to clarify what CLIA could accomplish for its member companies.

I developed mission, vision, strategic objectives, and decision materials for the Global Executive Committee to engage industry leaders on shared priorities, organizational structure, and CLIA’s role — establishing a foundation for a multi-year strategic plan.

  • CLIA needed to articulate what its member companies could achieve together beyond their individual efforts. The CEO’s listening tour provided a starting point for examining the association’s value and future direction.

    I synthesized those perspectives alongside industry analysis, organizational priorities, and financial context into a proposed operating approach and the foundation for a multi-year strategic plan. The materials gave the CEO and Global Executive Committee a basis for discussing shared priorities, organizational structure, and where CLIA could add the most value.

Greater Than Hate

Civil rights coalition

Pushing back by pulling together

Diagram of a human head showing the brain, ear, and eye, with labels indicating the olfactory bulb, sensory cortex, cochlea, and retina.

Following the 2022 elections, eight organizations came together anticipating a wave of state legislation targeting reproductive freedom, women’s rights, racial justice, and LGBTQ+ communities. Greater Than Hate created a way to respond together, drawing on each organization’s relationships and credibility to reach different audiences.

As coalition manager, I turned legislative updates and member input into coordinated campaign plans, working across participating organizations, state partners, and digital and communications agencies.

The campaign reached 4M people and drove nearly 6,000 supporter actions.

  • The coalition connected organizations working on LGBTQ+ equality, racial justice, reproductive freedom, education, and gun safety. Its strength came from recognizing that these attacks crossed communities — and that different organizations could bring trusted voices to the response.

    I worked with HRC’s team tracking state legislation and with coalition members to identify where a coordinated response could help. I turned those priorities into campaign plans, coordinating digital and communications agencies, state partners, and shared actions.

    For paid digital, I worked with Blue State on audience and creative priorities, spending recommendations, performance monitoring, and reporting.

Abundance Strategies

Cases for support & impact documents

Making the case for work that matters

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Through my ongoing partnership with Abundance Strategies, I’ve written more than 50 cases for support and funding proposals, helping organizations make the case for more than $50M in funding.

I work with organizational leaders to draw out the insights, stories, and evidence that reveal the significance of their work — often helping them articulate impact they’ve struggled to describe. I shape that material into a compelling case for why their work matters, what distinguishes their approach, and what additional investments will make possible.

  • The strongest material often emerges through conversation. I ask questions, probe broad claims, and help leaders connect what they do every day to the change they’re trying to create. That process can surface results they’ve overlooked, clarify what makes their approach distinctive, and sharpen their explanation of what comes next.

    From there, I build a narrative that connects the stakes, the organization’s contribution, and the opportunity for a funder to make a difference. I make choices about what to lead with, which evidence carries the argument, and how much context a reader needs.

    The work ranges from concise proposals for immediate funding needs to fuller cases for multi-year support, along with impact documents that show what prior investment has made possible.

Story Strategy Group

Co-founder & COO

Building a business around the power of story

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I co-founded Story Strategy Group and helped grow the remote consultancy and innovation studio to nearly $2M in annual revenue, building its financial, commercial, and delivery systems.

We help organizations and funders use narrative to drive social change — through investment advising, program design, audience research, storytelling, and convenings that bring people together to learn and collaborate.

Explore Story Strategy Group →

Hey there.

Dom here.

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I’m a queer Latino progressive raised in Utah and Texas. Working for social change has been part of my life since long before it became my career.

Over the past 18 years, I’ve worked on social change from several angles: helping funders decide where to invest, building national political outreach programs, and advising leaders through campaigns and organizational change. I founded GSD Political in 2017 to bring that experience to nonprofit, philanthropic, and advocacy organizations.

Today, I’m co-founder and COO of Story Strategy Group, a senior advisor to Rock the Vote, and an ongoing partner to Abundance Strategies. GSD Political remains my independent advisory practice.

I’m drawn to work that requires political judgment, brings different perspectives together, and turns ideas into action.

Contact

Let’s talk.

Have a strategic challenge, a role in mind, or an idea for working together? I’d welcome a conversation.

hello@domlowell.com