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The voters of America have just elected as their president the least conventionally qualified candidate in the nation’s history.

While it is true that Hillary Clinton won the popular vote, she did not prevail in the Electoral College. Her concentration of votes in California, New York and Illinois, where she won by exceptionally large margins, could not offset Donald Trump’s victories in other states by much narrower margins.

Our Electoral College system requires that you spread your votes across the country, and does not reward running up big majorities in just a few states. Clinton took 19 states plus the District of Columbia, while Trump took the remaining 31 states. Even among the 10 states with the most electoral votes (almost half of the total electoral votes), Trump won, usually with narrow margins, in seven.

During the Republican primaries, most of the media missed the real story. While focusing on Trump’s unconventional campaign tactics, his criticisms of the Republican establishment, and the potential divisions he would create within the Republican Party, the media failed to acknowledge a clever campaign that developed messages attractive to all elements of his party.

Concerns about immigration, imports and Obamacare united Republicans. Trump’s message against “unfair” Republican elites played well with Tea Party Republicans. He touched the social conservative base with pro-life views, and a promise to appoint conservative Supreme Court justices.

Trump did not alienate moderate Republicans by listing programs he wanted to terminate or reduce, but instead offered new ones such as infrastructure improvement to be paid for by the growth his economic policies (lower taxes, less regulation, better trade deals) would create.

In the primaries, Trump was able to split the conservative and evangelical vote with Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, while winning the moderate vote. The media chose to focus on the instability of his views concerning his chosen issues, while the voters focused on the messages he was sending in the general selection of his issue set.

Trump did not turn out a mass of hidden white voters, previously alienated from the voting process. First-time voters were 10 percent of the electorate, and they broke 56 percent for Clinton, 40 percent for Trump. Moreover, the white vote in 2016 was two points less than it had been in 2012.

The general election was Hillary Clinton’s to lose, and she lost it. A former first lady, senator and secretary of state ran against a political novice. She spent more money, benefited from a much larger, better organized, and more professional campaign operation, and seemed to head a more united party. How did she lose the election? The exit polls provide some answers.

Trump’s 12-point negative gender gap with women was offset by his 12-point positive gender gap with men. In comparison with Romney in 2012, at the margins Trump’s vote was more male, less educated, lower in income, more Catholic, more unmarried.

While Trump polled just a little above Romney in total votes, the structure of his vote was different. He drew higher percentages of the non-white vote and of the union household vote than Romney did. Trump won over some normally Democrat and independent-Democrat voters. Moreover, the white evangelical vote, 26 percent of the total vote and usually a reliable Republican vote, really performed for Trump as it broke 81 percent Trump and only 16 percent Clinton.

During the general election, Trump continued with the issues he raised during the primaries, but he also added three new issues. The primary elections had indicated problems with Republican women. There were concerns that Trump would do poorly with suburban white women in the general election.

At the Republican National Convention, Ivanka Trump introduced a child care program, and during the campaign Trump directed attention to inner city problems. (“What do you have to lose?”)

Late in the campaign, Trump played up the corruption issue that had always been a part of his rhetoric, but was now fleshed out with specific policies to “drain the swamp.” These issues were designed to appeal to suburban moderate Republican women voters, and to even pick up some non-white and other possible Democrat crossover votes.

Trump had some success here as 90 percent of the Republican vote came home to him despite the activities of the #NeverTrumpers. He performed several points better than Romney with the non-white vote, and there were clearly crossover blue collar votes for Trump.

Trump’s campaign understood this was a change election, and positioned Trump as the change candidate. Thirty-nine percent of all voters considered “bringing change” the most important candidate quality, and Trump won 83 percent of them. Sixty-two percent of the voters felt the country was on the “wrong track,” and Trump won 69 percent of them. Sixty-three percent of the voters believed the condition of the economy was bad, and Trump won 63 percent of them as well.

Clinton faced a change election where she had to please two constituencies: Obama loyalists who promoted the idea that Obama had fixed the economy, and Sanders’ supporters from the left of the party who emphasized problems yet to be solved through increased taxing and spending. This left Clinton, often associated with more moderate Democrats than either Obama or Sanders, with a confused message.

It was easy to identify several Trump issues related to change. These were publicized extensively by both friends and foes of his campaign, as well as being centerpieces of his many public rallies. It was much more difficult for the normal voter to identify specific change issues associated with Clinton.

Clinton banked on making Trump an unacceptable choice rather than presenting a clear vision for America’s future. Certainly, Trump spent a lot of time making Clinton unacceptable as well, but he also identified key issues that his campaign hoped would appeal to a broad electorate.

Two exit polls illustrate Clinton’s problem. In most presidential elections, voters consider the candidate they vote for favorably — and the other major party candidate unfavorably. In this election, those 41 percent of the electorate who rated only Clinton favorably voted 98 percent for her. Those 36 percent of the electorate who rated only Trump favorably voted 98% for him.

However, 18 percent of the electorate rated both major party candidates unfavorably. They went 29 percent for Clinton, 49 percent for Trump, and 22 percent for a third party. The negative messages from both campaigns alienated these voters toward both candidacies, but rather than stay away from the polls, they mainly gave Trump their votes —and gave Clinton just a few points more than they gave to third parties.

In a change year with two flawed candidates, pick the change agent.

Another interesting exit poll asked the voters how they would feel if Clinton won/Trump won. Those who felt “excited” or “optimistic” about one of the candidates voted for that candidate. Those who felt “scared” about one of the candidates voted for the other major party candidate or third party. The 24 percent of the electorate who expressed “concerned” feelings about a Clinton win voted only 18 percent for her. The 20 percent of the electorate who expressed “concerned” feelings about a Trump win voted 34 percent for him. These were the “persuadable” voters, and Trump did far better with them than Clinton did.

The impacts of the major “disqualifying” issues on the two candidates largely offset each other. 45 percent of the voters were bothered “a lot” by Clinton’s use of e-mail, and these went 87 perecent for Trump. 50 percent of the voters were bothered “a lot” by Trump’s treatment of women, and these went 83 percent for Clinton. This illustrated the need to do more than just disqualify the other candidate.

Certain assumptions about this race turned out to be incorrect. This was not a low turnout election, although some thought the nastiness of both campaigns would drive voters away. The percentage of voting age population who show up at the polls has run between 50 percent and 55 percent for most elections since 1972. The 2008 Obama election did set a modern record at 59 percent of the voting age population. However, the 2012 election polled at 55 percent. Once all the votes have been finally counted, it is likely the 2016 turnout will be on the high side of the normal range.

Non-white voters did not stay home, but increased their share of total voters by 2 points over 2012—from 28 percent to 30 percent of total voters. Trump did marginally better than Romney with these voters. Clinton did lose Obama voters — both to Trump and to third parties — but it was more because these voters left the Democrats than didn’t show up at the polls.

Trump did not turn out a mass of hidden white voters, previously alienated from the voting process. First-time voters were 10 percent of the electorate, and they broke 56 percent for Clinton, 40 percent for Trump. Moreover, the white vote in 2016 was two points less than it had been in 2012.

Clinton lost more votes from Democrat constituencies than Trump lost from Republican constituencies. She could never solve the puzzle of how to position herself to an electorate desirous of change. She spent too much time trying to drive up Trump’s negatives (with little understanding of the law of diminishing returns), and too little time on fashioning a clear vision that could be simply presented to voters.

Her use of surrogates hurt her in two ways. First, she seemed less of her own person. Second, the surrogates contributed to the confusion of her message. President Obama wanted voters to vote for Clinton to preserve his legacy. Sanders wanted voters to vote for her to bring new, expensive programs into effect. Bill Clinton tried to make white working class voters in flyover country understand that his wife was their champion as well.

In the end, the voters knew who Trump was, or, at least, the main ideas of his campaign. Steve Bannon and Kellyanne Conway kept their too often undisciplined candidate on message in the final days of the campaign. Late deciders in the last week of the campaign broke strongly for Trump. The voters ended up with little idea of who Clinton was, or what kind of change she would bring to America.

The WikiLeaks memo that talked of Clinton having a private position and a public position on issues could have been the summation of her problem with the voters. What can we count on her to do to really improve our lives?

In the end, the voters in 31 states, with 306 electoral votes, decided to roll the dice with Donald Trump.