How to convince your friends to vote for your favorite 2016 candidate, in 6 easy steps

Congratulations! You've made it through approximately 793 debates, thousands of soundbites, endless nasty mudslinging, and multiple forests worth of campaign mailers to finally land on the person you want to vote for for president. Now, you just need to convince other people to throw their support behind your candidate.

But how do you do that? Just follow our simple guide. If you do it right, you'll be more successful than Carly Fiorina, Chris Christie, Martin O'Malley, and Jim Gilmore combined.

1. Know your candidate's record

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First and foremost, if you don't know where your candidate stands on the issues, you have no business supporting them, let alone asking other people to do so. They all have websites that spell out what they will do if elected, and if you're backing a current or former elected official, you can easily look up how they voted in the past and see what bills they wrote. There are tons of different fact-finding missions you can go on — block out an entire day to scroll through every single one of Donald Trump's tweets, read Ben Carson's book Gifted Hands (or, watch the made-for-TV movie starring Cuba Gooding Jr.). Once you think you're prepared to answer both basic and more advanced questions about your candidate's beliefs, proceed to Step 2.

2. Show some respect

Even the coolest of heads can get heated when discussing politics, but remember, these are your friends you're talking to, and you want to keep your relationships intact through several more election cycles. If you're dealing with someone who is on the fence, don't insult them by questioning why they haven't made a decision yet. If someone is adamant about not liking your candidate, don't take it personally, and see if you can find some common ground (for example, are they complaining about student loan debt? Take the opportunity to share your candidate's stance on lowering the burden).

Admit that regardless of who you support, it is exciting that there are several firsts that could come out of this election — the first woman president, the first Jewish president, the first Latino president, the first retired neurosurgeon that makes us wonder "is he or isn't he asleep?" president. And as for Hillary: Love her or hate her, you should be mindful of what it took for women to get the vote, and while there's no need to go weep and gnash your teeth at the grave of Susan B. Anthony, try not to be so blasé about how far women have come in politics.

3. Keep your excitement in check

Each candidate has some militant fans, and one way to quickly lose a person's interest is to get in their face and bark facts about the person you're backing; there's a fine line between being passionate and being a zealot. Try to read your friends so you know when they are receptive to listening to you — if they bring up the latest Republican debate or Democratic caucus, then it's well within your right to get a discussion going about your candidate and how they performed. By not forcing the topic, people will be much more open to hearing your message. You run into trouble when you take everything as an opening — If someone asks what time it is, don't yell, "It's Marco Rubio time!" You will lose the friends you have, and you will deserve it.

4. Be strategic

You know what appeals to your friends, so target them in very specific ways. If they process things better visually, invite them over to your house for a debate-watching party, or take them to a campaign rally. If they soak things in by reading, gather up the links to some of your favorite articles about your candidate and shoot them over to your friend in an email. Find out what they like about the other candidates, and if applicable, calmly tell them how your candidate better embodies that trait. If they can be bought, put together a goodie bag filled with buttons, stickers, car magnets, and other campaign gear and drop it off at their house (also, skip ahead to Step 6). By placing your focus on these areas, you'll reach your goal of luring them to your way of thinking much, much faster.

5. Know when to shut up

At some point, no matter how hard you try, you are going to find some friends unmoved by your pitch for your beloved candidate. Some people believe deep in their bones that single-payer healthcare is very bad, while others have no desire to see a wall go up between the U.S. and Mexico, no matter how beautiful. Be proud: You did your best to share all of your candidate's ideas and values, and some of it had to stick. Once you've reached the point of knowing it's unlikely you'll ever change their mind, drop the talking points, and go back to whatever you and your pal used to chat about, back in the day when Donald Trump was just a billionaire firing people on The Apprentice and not the likely Republican nominee for president.

6. Don't rule out casual bribery

When all else fails, you could always resort to some kickbacks. It doesn't have to (and shouldn't!) involve briefcases full of money — it could be as simple as offering to not only drop a friend off but also pick them up next time they have to go to the airport. All they have to do is remember who buttered their bread when they're at the polls. Morally, it's wrong, I know. But remember, this is politics we're talking about.

Now, I already know who I'm going to vote for when California finally has its primary, and the only way that will change is if Betty White suddenly enters the race (because think about it, what's better than having a Golden Girl in the White House?). But this is a crazy, off-the-wall exciting year in politics, and we should all be talking about and learning from this election. It's a good thing to be energized, and while you might not get everyone to back your candidate, if in the process of proselytizing you've become a more informed voter, that's ultimately a win for democracy.