In recent times mass marketing has been overturned by its hostile opposites like word of mouth, brand activation, consumer evangelism, cable television, the Internet and other social media options. New marketing practices and channel opportunities are exploding, consumer habits and values are fast changing, and markets are fragmenting. For most political marketers, the pressing issue is how to get the political product to “sell across the ever-changing, proliferating and quickly morphing media landscape” to efficiently reach targeted voting publics.
We live in an age of highly segmented markets, where mass consumerism is either dead or dying, and where voters are increasingly knowledgeable about candidates and cannot be tricked, or so you hope. This environment makes creating successful political campaigns a big challenge since the competition is no longer confined to creating awareness and projecting a differentiated vision or key message through traditional media.
A large number of voters today are from the youth sector. Some are first-time participants in the electoral process. In the new media age, the youth are the first generation to ”discover it all,” thanks to Google, which has become an all-important tool to find data needed in professional and personal research. They, too, are actively engaged with Yahoo and other social networks and online sites, participating in electronic voting for their favorite housemate in Pinoy Big Brother and getting intimate with the budding romance of big winner Melai and third placer Jayson, also known as the Melason love team of PBB.
The youth voters create their own content and post it on YouTube, and share it via Napster, KaZaa, P2P or Torrent. They go virtual with role-playing games (RPGs) like Tamagotchi, CounterStrike, Farmville or Mafia Wars. Never before has any group had total permanent connectivity to all peers with SMS and MMS devices available in various colors, shapes and configurations, used as lifelines to friends. That’s why being in school, at work or even asleep is no excuse to ignore a friend who asks for help. Today, the mobile phone is the only device that more than 40 percent of the world carries.
The youth of today is no longer a captive audience. They are moving targets who will soon erase “primetime” from their vocabulary. They are always connected to their friends and the Internet, and most likely are talking about people, issues, events and products. They have turned into active consumers or viewers, and are now both the spectators and producers of their own stories. They decide on their own what marketing idea to consume, at what time, where and how, and how to react to it. They follow brands that offer something unique and answer their lifestyle needs. As author Seth Godin said in his book, Purple Cow, “One has to be remarkable, worth talking about, noticeable, exceptional, new and interesting to be appealing to young people.”
Thus, the challenge to political candidates is to make themselves palatable to young and new voters. Let me share with you an eight-step process for building a successful political campaign even on a limited budget.
1. Keep the fire burning with the youth. Focus your promotions on the youth, who will enthusiastically endorse your candidate to their peers. Ignite their temperature using aggressive, non-traditional advertising so they light up easily and eventually burn hot to create fires that can be kept ablaze until Election Day.
2. Work up a stimulus that can generate the desired response. Give them a time and an experience with your candidate. If you want the young to laugh, “Don’t tell them your candidate is funny, ask him to deliver a joke about himself or related to him. Experience is the shortcut to understanding the candidate’s persona. It touches people deeply and generates more heat than above-the-line communication, igniting even the mildly interested, especially if the experience is fulfilling and unforgettable.
3. Tell great stories, share great values. Great communication is all about great storytelling. The story that must be told must be a reflection of the candidate’s humanity and his values, which can be paralleled as his constituents’ own. Every wound, every scar from his struggles in life has an interesting story waiting to be told. Let the candidate share them. They can be very good copy.
4. Create the candidate’s worthiness in what he does. His connection, his uniqueness and the variety he brings to his and his publics’ life. As Abraham Lincoln said, “The best way to predict your future is to create it.”
5. Appreciate and understand the power of the new media. Give the young the right messages that they can spread throughout their social networks. Sometimes, people spread messages more effectively than paid ads. Leveraging the power of personal influence among the youth is an effective and efficient way to expand your marketing fire beyond its point of origin to the masses. By understanding the processes of the new media, you can equip people with tools to exponentially increase their reach and influence.
6. Turn the youth into rabid evangelists. It may be difficult, but if you are successful in doing so, the chance of a candidate winning the race will surely increase. To do this you have to stop interrupting, directing, shouting, using high-powered messages that don’t connect, reacting, constantly looking for return on investment, offering big promises, and too much explaining, and instead start engaging, connecting, enticing, building engaging platforms, interacting, looking for return on involvement, using intimate gestures and being more revealing and discovering.
7. Deliver value through your political campaign. Or more simply talk more on how you can make people’s lives better. It sounds simple enough, but how can you do this? Build the marketing into the candidate. Make him so grand and noble, people can’t help but talk about him. You can follow US President Barack Obama’s lead and engage the electorate and make a strong commitment. Young people will feel more confident if the candidate’s program continues to be part of their life. To move this, have a lot of insights, observe and listen to them.
8. Keep a database of voters you meet in your political marketing efforts. This will be important in quickly and easily reaching them to help the candidate fan the flames or to tell them new stories that can match their interests. This also allows the political campaign to build equity and keep pace with the needs of your growing constituency, and ensures that you won’t have to start the next election campaign from scratch.
The new campaign paradigm is about creating and owning accountable value-exchange platforms and messages, created by the candidate in collaboration with targeted voters. The aspirants should now be built on what they do, not what they say, and are adopted or owned by their publics. Great content creates conversation; great campaigning builds experience and engagement. Propelled by the bandwagon effect, this will win reach and support for the candidate.
A candidate can build his personal brand by creating and sharing measured programs and platforms that attract, engage, acquire and retain the loyalty of the electorates. He has to create worth. It is a sure way to win people’s hearts and minds.
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E-mail bongosorio@yahoo.com or bong_osorio@abs-cbn.com for comments, questions or suggestions. Thank you for communicating.