Sun Communicators' Group Blog

Part 2: Communications Lessons from the Presidential Campaign Trail

With less than a week to go before the NH Presidential Primary, I wanted to continue to share some of the communications tactics that I'm seeing and experiencing, first hand, as a Registered voter in NH.   I began to share some insights and observations re: the communications activities of various campaigns at the end of November. (It's important to note that these are purely communications related observations and not political opinions/viewpoints or endorsements!)

Here is what has happened since that entry.

1) I did get tickets to the Oprah/Obama event that I blogged about, but the day before the event, I chose not attend.  

After some reflection, I decided not to attend a campaign event just to see a celebrity endorser.    Because of this decision, I also passed on an offer for tickets to see Bonnie Raitt and Jackson Brown join John Edwards for some NH campaign stops just a few days before Christmas.

Here's what I learned from a communications perspective when it comes to behavior and endorsements:  Free tickets to hear from celebrities and to see them perform do, indeed,  bring attention  to a message that you are trying to get out.  People arrived in droves to see Oprah, Bonnie Raitt and others  - then became a captive audience for a political speech.  In thinking about this from a Business Communications sense, I see this at Sun all the time, but just never made the connection! While any of our Sun execs can draw a crowd at an internal town hall or even external customer event, we always see a bigger turnout when we have Jonathan or Scott participate, too.  

2) My previous observation re: telephone calls being a good mix in a communications campaign needs to be clarified.   Such use of the telephone should be in moderation.   There's nothing worse that repeated calls from the same campaigns (Obama's and Edward's campaigns are the biggest violators of this in my house - endless calls a day from different people reading scripts or asking the very personal question re: whom I plan to vote for not a good communications tactic)

I have recently managed to reduce this influx of calls to my house since I've told these campaigns that I've already voted (via absentee ballot since I was scheduled to travel during Primary week).  This leads me to the next point....

3) Make your communications stand out from the others that may compete with your messages!  With upwards of 10+ pieces of direct mail from campaigns almost daily,  Hillary's campaign, while not good at the telephone follow up as I discussed in November, has been very good at being different and communicating helpful information. 

I received my absentee ballot in mid December because Hillary's campaign made it easy for me!  One of her direct mail pieces that stood out from all of the others included a form to mail to my City Clerk.  Within 48 hrs of using this form, my absentee ballot was in my mail box.   Interestingly, a few days later, I also received a Holiday Card from "The Clinton Family" (of Manchester, NH!?!?!)  It was the only holiday greeting that I received this current political season.   (I also heard this am that her campaign is offering snow shovels and babysitters for Iowans who need such assistance to get out to caucus tonite.) 

And then a few days after I received the Holiday greeting, an invitation arrived to dial in to a conference call with "Bill and Hill" on Sunday evening December 23rd.  (Of course I dialed in - for the sake of my communications research!)

In my role at Sun, I plan many large broadcast concalls with our executives, so I was interested to see how this would work in the world of political campaigns, especially on a Sunday evening, two days before Christmas.  While the 'host' was on the call live, she did admit that due to being caught in a snowstorm in Iowa, the Clintons had to do a recorded message for the call.  (Knowing that Bill & Hill  probably fly a private jet between Iowa and NY, I found this disappointing, but stayed on the line to listen.)  The good news is that the entire call lasted barely 20 minutes and and it didn't 'sound' canned or recorded.  

Interestingly, you can tell which candidates have the big money for their communications efforts.   Those  who are behind in some of the polls just don't have the money to bring in celebrities and musicians. Don't forget, while these 'endorsers' are often giving their time, the campaigns have to scramble to secure and often pay for big venues to host such events.  When Oprah was coming to NH, Obama's local campaign office was in a frenzy looking for a venue large enough to hold such an event.

The good thing for the lower budget campaigns is that Web 2.0 tools are often free, viral and can effectively get a message out.  Ron Paul was one of the most Googled names in 2007.   Could it be because of the bumperstickers and huge homemade signs that many of us in NH see when we drive down the road?   Or because of the focus of so many blogs bringing up his name because of his unique focus compared to other candidates in his party?  Maybe a little of both!?

So while the past year in NH has been very interesting (and a great learning experience!), I have to admit that I'm looking forward to some silence from fewer phonecalls and doorbells ringing. 

And ,I wonder what 2011 Primary activity will bring for learnings as we prepare for the 2012 election?!

Posted at 08:48AM Jan 03, 2008 by sandyb in Best Practices  |  Comments[0]