Just Decided to Run? Your First Seven Days as a Wisconsin Candidate

The day you decide to run is the easiest day to waste. You feel fired up, you tell a few people, and a week later you still haven't picked up the phone to ask a single question.

Tony RuffiOct 29, 20268 min read

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This article lays out your first seven days as a Wisconsin candidate, one job per day. By the end of this article, you'll know who to call, what to set up and what to put on one page. That way the weeks before papers are due won't catch you off guard.

What should you do first after deciding to run?

Call the office that takes your papers, which is usually your city, village, town or school district clerk. Ask five plain questions about your seat before you do anything else. Their answers set your dates, your signature count and your forms. Everything else in your first week gets built on those five answers.

This article is general information, not legal advice. Rules and dates change, and they differ by office. Confirm yours with the Wisconsin Elections Commission and your filing officer, who is the clerk or office where you file your papers.

Day one: who do you call, and what do you ask?

Call your clerk, and ask the five questions in the table below. Write down the answers, the date and the name of the person who gave them. A filing officer deals with this all the time, and most are glad to help someone who asks early. Don't wait until December to find out what you needed in October.

Nomination papers are the sheets where voters in your district sign to say they want you on the ballot. Our nomination papers article covers what makes a signature count and what gets one thrown out.

Day two: who needs to hear it from you first?

Your family, your boss and your closest friends need to hear it before the town does. Running takes time away from all of them for months. If the people at your kitchen table aren't on board, the race gets harder every week. Ask each one for something small and specific, like covering dinner on door-knocking nights.

The biggest thing we tell new candidates is to put their team together in the first week. Talk to people who work in politics, get advice from people who have done it before, and then trust them. Running for office isn't a business decision. In business, you always have tomorrow. In politics, tomorrow is gone and the next day is already here.

Pick one person to be your treasurer too, which is the person who tracks the money. Choose someone careful and steady, not just someone who is a friend. Our first-time finance article shows what that job looks like.

Day three: what do you need to set up before you raise a dollar?

Set up your campaign committee and your own web address. Under the Wisconsin Ethics Commission's candidate page, you register a committee as soon as practicable after you file papers, take a contribution or spend money for your race. Local candidates file the form, called the CF-1L, on paper with their clerk.

Your web address matters as much as the form. Buy your domain name in your own name this week, and never let a friend, a builder or an agency own it for you. A website lets you tell your story the way you want it told, instead of letting a news story tell it for you. Our campaign website article covers what goes on it.

Don't take money from anyone before your committee is set up. Ask your clerk what to do about the first dollar, and read the Ethics Commission candidate page the same day.

Day four: how do you decide what voters see first?

Pick the name you want on the ballot, get one good photo and choose a few simple words about why you're running. These three things show up on every sign, card and post you make. Picking them early keeps you from rebuilding your look in January, when you have no time left.

Say your reason out loud to a neighbor. If they can repeat it back in one sentence, it works. If they look puzzled, cut it down. Our no-experience article has help for a first-timer who isn't sure what to say.

Day five: who are your first twenty-five people?

Write the names of twenty-five people who would say yes if you asked for help. Then ask them, in person if you can. This list is your first volunteers, your first signers and your first donors. It's also the start of your email list, so keep every name and number in one place.

We keep this simple: call, don't text, for the first ask. A voice is harder to ignore than a message. Our volunteers article goes deeper on what to ask each person to do.

Day six: when do you start knocking doors?

Start now. Knock on doors with any free time you have, even a spare half hour, because a voter who has met you remembers your name. Don't wait for your signs or your mail to be ready. A door is free, and nothing you'll buy later works as well.

Take your papers with you. While you're at a door, you can ask for a signature once the date is open. Dec. 1 is the first day a signature can count for a spring race. Ahead of that, you can introduce yourself and learn what people care about. Our door knocking script gives you words to start with.

Day seven: how do you put it all on one page?

Count backward from the filing deadline and write every date on a single page. For most spring offices, papers can go out no sooner than Dec. 1 and are due by 5 p.m. on the first Tuesday in January, which in 2027 is Jan. 5 (Wis. Stat. § 8.10). Check those dates against your clerk's calendar.

Then add the number that matters most. Take the signatures your seat needs and add 20% to it. That's our rule, not the law's. Some signatures get thrown out for small reasons, like a missing date or a signer who lives outside your district, and the extra ones keep you on the ballot. Our spring dates article lays out the full 2027 calendar, and our plan template article shows how to turn the dates into weekly jobs.

What did one new district teach us about starting early?

It taught us that a race with no old habits is a race anyone can win by showing up first. In 2024, Brent Jacobson ran for State Assembly in a newly created district and won with 66% of the vote (case study). No single week did that. But voters in a new district have no habit of voting for anyone, so the candidate who is known first has the edge.

That's why the seven days above matter. None of them is hard. Each one just has to happen early, before the holidays eat your calendar and before the people you need are busy with something else.

Where do new candidates slip in week one?

They spend money before they have a plan, wait to call the clerk and tell too many people too soon what they'll do on a hard issue. All three are fixed by the same habit, which is to ask first and spend second. Here are the slips we see most:

• Printing signs first. A sign needs your "Paid for by" line and your final ballot name, and both can change. Our yard sign article has the details.
• Waiting for December. The five clerk questions take a day in October and cost a week in January.
• Skipping the committee. Money that doesn't flow through your registered committee makes trouble later.
• A domain in someone else's name. If you don't own it, you don't control it.
• Doing it alone. Every race we've seen is stronger with a small team around the candidate.
• Announcing before you're ready. Our announcement article shows how to time it.

Tonight's three jobs

Before you sleep, do these three things. Write down the five clerk questions and put the call on your calendar. Name the one person at your kitchen table you'll tell first. Then open a blank page and write the filing date at the top of it.

Want a second set of eyes on your plan? We work with candidates across all of Wisconsin, including the Northwoods, at every level from school board to Congress & governor. Call 715-314-3250 and we'll talk it through, or set up a free first call.

This article is general information, not legal advice. Dates, forms and signature counts change by office and by year. Check them with the Wisconsin Elections Commission and your filing officer before you rely on them.

Fact-checked October 28, 2026 against the Wisconsin Ethics Commission candidate committee page and the Bluejack case study for the 87th Assembly race.