Grasstops Vs Grassroots: Here’s What You Need to Know

Grasstops vs Grassroots: There’s no getting around the fact that creating change is difficult.

If you have ever tried to change an individual’s mind or preferences, you can imagine how much harder it is to change a group of people or a commonly accepted political stance.

What does it take to be successful?

Advocacy campaigning is the effort organizations undertake to force specific change. They target decision makers (most often in government positions), encouraging them to alter their views or take action.

And there are a couple of ways to go about it, namely:

• Grasstops advocacy
• Grassroots advocacy

Grasstops vs grassroots at a glance

The short answer: grasstops gets you in the room, and grassroots shows the decision maker why it matters. Most winning campaigns use both, as the sections below explain.

Grasstops vs grassroots advocacy differences

Grasstops advocacy

Grasstops advocacy involves enlisting individuals with personal connections to the decision makers you are targeting. That’s how we can differentiate grasstops vs grassroots advocacy.

Examples of this might be political donors, current and former community leaders of the decision makers’ political party, or other influential people.

In the summer of 2022, a Senate vote on the PACT Act, which expanded care for veterans exposed to toxic burn pits, unexpectedly stalled. Veterans and their families camped on the Capitol steps. Comedian Jon Stewart stood with them and called out, by name, the senators who had switched their votes. Within a week, the Senate passed the bill 86 to 11, and it was signed into law on August 10, 2022. Stewart had no official role. He had a platform and lawmakers’ attention.

The PACT Act was signed into law. Photo Credits: Evan Vucci

Grasstops advocates reach out to the targeted decision makers in a number of ways, like in-person meetings, emails and letters, and patch-through calls.

Grassroots advocacy

Grassroots advocacy involves getting ordinary people to start powerful conversations with their elected officials about the issues they care about.

By combining and channeling many voices around a single issue, you have a better chance of getting community leaders to sit up and listen.

These efforts often come in the form of rallies, patch-through phone calls, and emails.

Here’s what that looks like at a state capitol. In a 2026 case study, the nonpartisan group American Promise described a peer-to-peer text bank that backed a state legislative campaign. Its team sent tens of thousands of texts and moved hundreds of people to act, and legislators later told them the outreach affected their decision. Read the American Promise story.

Is one more effective than the other?

While both grasstops and grassroots advocacy involve confronting legislators, the key consideration is whether the decision makers you are targeting are better swayed by quality or quantity.

While planning your advocacy campaign, keep in mind the key constituents that can influence your targets. Those might be influential citizens or voters from their district or state.

While both quality and quantity have advantages, the greatest impact comes when you combine grasstops and grassroots advocacy.

Grasstops lobbying and grasstops campaigns, defined

Two terms come up constantly alongside this work, and they aren’t interchangeable. One describes an activity the law may regulate. The other describes how you organize your work. Here is the plain-language version of each.

What is grasstops lobbying?

Grasstops lobbying means asking a small number of influential people, those who already have a personal, professional, or political relationship with a specific lawmaker, to carry your policy ask to that lawmaker themselves. Persuasion happens through an existing relationship, not the number of contacts.

Lobbying has specific legal definitions, and how much of it an organization can do depends on what kind of organization it is. The IRS explains the rules for charities on its lobbying page, and federal or state lobbying laws may also apply. Check your own situation with your counsel before a grasstops campaign begins.

What is a grasstops campaign?

A grasstops campaign is the organized program built around that approach. You map the people who influence your target, recruit a short list of them as advocates, brief them on a specific ask, and coordinate their meetings, calls, and letters so the decision maker hears a consistent message from people they already trust.

A grassroots campaign is measured in reach: how many constituents you activated. A grasstops campaign is measured in access and follow-through: which relationships you secured, which offices you got in front of, and what those conversations moved. The sections below walk through how to run one, from identifying advocates to building relationships with legislative offices.

Combining grasstops and grassroots advocacy

If you want real change, it makes sense to attack the problem on as many fronts as possible.

That’s why your grassroots advocacy strategy should always be complemented by grasstops advocacy, and vice versa.

Here are some things to note before you set your advocacy campaign in motion.

Identify grasstops vs grassroots advocates

The most obvious way to find potential grasstops advocates is through research. Find potential connections of your targeted decision-maker that you can explore.

When you recruit grasstops advocates for your cause, you ask a lot of them. They will actively campaign for you, whether by traveling for face-to-face meetings or making personal phone calls to legislators. Be sure that your grasstops advocates know what they are signing up for.

You can also find both grasstops and grassroots advocates among your supporters.

Survey supporters offline or through calling or texting campaigns to find their level of comfort in going above and beyond for your cause, and any influence they may have.

Who are the grasstops in a union local?

Every local already has both kinds of advocates. The work is knowing which is which before a campaign starts.

Your grasstops are the members and allies a decision maker will take a call from:

• Former local officers who are still respected in the community
• Members who serve on a school board, city council, or county commission
• Long-serving stewards whom management already deals with by name
• Faith leaders, small-business owners, and community leaders who have stood with the local before

Your grassroots is every member, at every worksite and on every shift.

Here’s how the two work together. Say a local of public employees wants the city council to back a fair contract. A respected pastor and a retired local president meet the council president privately and make the case. The same week, hundreds of members call their own council members’ offices. The meeting tells the council who is asking. The calls tell them how many.

To find your grasstops, add one question to your next member survey: “Do you personally know an elected official, community leader, or business owner who might support us?” The answers often surprise organizers.

Building relationships with offices

Effective grasstops advocacy involves identifying key staff at your target legislators’ offices.

Itis best to cultivate these relationships well before the decision you want to influence.

For federal legislators, this means the beginning of a legislative session.

For state legislators, this would be before or during the adoption of a state budget.

Some ways to build these relationships:

• Meet with them 2 to 3 times a year
• Interact with them on social media
• Ask questions
• Contact them before key votes

Grassroots advocacy is simpler by comparison. You channel your supporters through public channels like email and phone calls before a vote.

What tools do you need?

For any advocacy campaign, you will need tools that make it easier to connect constituents with lawmakers.

Advocacy CRM

Grassroots advocacy runs on a clean list of supporters, so you need a database built for it. Whatever you choose, check that it can:

• Store each person’s district, so you can match them to their own representatives
• Flag your grasstops advocates and the relationships they hold
• Record every action each person has taken, so the next ask fits
• Sync with your calling and texting tools, so results flow back without manual entry

For a side-by-side look at advocacy tools, see our guide to advocacy software.

Patch-through calling software

One of the best ways to communicate with key stakeholders is through patch-through calls. Use a calling tool that allows you to patch constituents through to lawmakers.

NEAT, an LGBTQ+ advocacy group, used patch-through calls to ask supporters to talk to their local elected officials about equal rights for the LGBTQ+ community.

The agents spoke with supporters, educated them about the issue, and connected about 10 people with a representative in an hour.

Advocacy best practices

Take the time to research

Effective advocacy is built on the foundation of research.

From finding the right advocates for your cause to identifying the most persuasive points to share with stakeholders, research helps you put your best foot forward.

Make sure that your research:

• Focuses on the problem directly
• Looks at the root causes of the issue
• Is linked to your current campaign
• Is informed by the current policy environment, so you can identify policy gaps

Create a message to amplify

A successful message is specific.

That means for both grasstops and grassroots advocacy, you need to give your advocates the key talking points that they need to convey to a lawmaker.

Two points to note while crafting your message:

• Specify the concerns for your cause
• Specify the action a lawmaker can take for you

Selecting communication channels

For an advocacy campaign, communication goes both ways.

You will need to get your message in front of the general public and your supporters through:

• Advertisements
• Press releases
• Social media
• Events

As well as the decision-making levels of government through:

• Community meetings
• Letters
• Calls
• Petitions
• Committee appearances

Be transparent with your advocates

An informed supporter is an enthusiastic one.

Make sure they know:

• What you plan to achieve through your campaign
• What action you want them to take, whether it’s making calls or spreading the word through social media
• Your victories, because keeping supporters updated on your progress keeps motivation high

Persistence is key

One way to cut through the noise is to communicate as often as possible.

This goes both ways. You want to keep your supporters informed about your cause, and you want to get your message to decision makers as often as possible.

Be prepared to commit to the long term.

According to a Networked Change report, “unseen by most observers, many of the most successful major advocacy grassroots campaigns we studied spent years building up power, scaling their networks and honing their story away from the limelight before they broke into the national consciousness and scored dramatic victories.”

Gather feedback from advocates

Your grasstops advocates can share insights after their meetings with legislators that you won’t get anywhere else.

Set up a questionnaire that your advocates can fill out after a meeting. Meeting insights can inform campaign strategy moving forward.

Keep the results organized, so stakeholders can easily see how the campaign is working.

The way forward

Jon Stewart didn’t win that 2022 vote alone. He stood beside veterans who had been camped on the Capitol steps for days. That’s the combination this guide is about: a few people with access, backed by many people with a stake.

Start by listing your grasstops and your grassroots side by side. Then plan the moment both reach the same decision maker. When the grassroots side needs volume, patch-through calls connect supporters straight to their lawmakers’ offices. For the bigger picture, read what grassroots advocacy is.

Grasstops vs grassroots: Quick answers

What is the difference between grasstops and grassroots advocacy? Grasstops advocacy uses a few influential people who have direct access to a decision maker. Grassroots advocacy uses many ordinary constituents to show broad support.

Is grasstops advocacy better than grassroots? Neither is better on its own. Grasstops brings credibility and access, and grassroots brings numbers. Campaigns that combine them usually have the most influence.

Can a small organization use grasstops advocacy? Yes. Most small organizations already have a few members or allies who know an elected official. Ask in your next survey, then involve them early.

Is grasstops advocacy the same as lobbying? Not necessarily. Grasstops is a strategy. Whether a particular activity counts as lobbying depends on the rules that apply to your organization. See the IRS lobbying page if you’re a charity.