New Afghan President Tore Page Straight From Obama-Like Playbook

The road to a new Afghan government has been paved with confusion over election results, accusations of fraud and the shape of a new unity coalition. But for newly inaugurated President Ashraf Ghani, his campaign strategy was just the opposite, largely mimicking those of successful Western politicians like President Obama, Ghani's social media guru and longtime adviser said.

"We did take cues from other campaigns; we studied up on them," Hamdullah Mohib said in an interview with ABC News before Ghani's victory was certified Sunday by a United Nations-supervised election audit.

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The exact vote tally is being withheld for now but, as of Monday, Ghani was officially the new president. During Mohib's visit back in July, he shared some keys to his candidate's victory, which bears a striking resemblance to those that netted Obama two terms in office.

1. Keep it simple.

Ghani's background as an academic and technocrat meant he was used to speaking with high-level officials, not throngs of everyday Afghans. So he had to work on appealing to voters without speaking down to them. "His language is not as simple," Mohib said. "He had to work on that to make sure he can simplify what he says so he can reach the masses."

Plus, not everyone in the country is literate. To make the balloting process simple, Ghani campaign workers passed out cards with symbols that would show them what to do, as in showing which box they would need to tick next to a picture of Ghani's face. That was a lesson learned after a preliminary round of voting in which Ghani lost handily to Abdullah. "We had problems in the first round," Mohib said.

2. Network, network, network.

Like successful U.S. campaigns, the Ghani team first targeted the support of influential voices within individual communities. In Afghanistan, those tend to be the leaders of mosques and, Mohib said, Ghani's campaign won the coveted clerical vote. "The day before this election, in these provinces the imams told people it's their civic duty to vote," Mohib said.

The campaign also used a robust social media presence (like Obama, Ghani signs his personal tweets with his initials - "AG" - and his team routinely live-posted about his campaign events) to reach better connected, more educated Afghans who, in turn, would sway their family members toward whom to support. "When we reach one influential, educated person who has access and can afford Internet in the country, [he] has influence over the rest of the family," Mohib said. "It's a conservative society where people go by what others say."

3. Keep that network.

Like the Obama campaign, which converted its Obama for America campaign apparatus into "Organizing for Action," a second-term organization that focused on implementing the president's policies, the Ghani campaign wants to apply its Election Day(s) network to the business of governing. "We have a way for [Ghani] to know what's happening and how [voters] feel" down to the tiniest village, Mohib said. "Once you build a network, you don't let a network go."