Joe Biden My Winner of Best Political Ads of 2015

No politics from me, yet. However, I did want to share my favorite campaign advertisement to date based purely on the criteria that the ads stop and pull you in. Needless to say, the campaign did not, however, accomplish its mission.

• "Published on Oct 13, 2015: This is the second television ad released by the Draft Biden 2016 Super-PAC, asking Joe Biden to run for President in 2016. Joe Biden was proud to work alongside President Obama to rebuild our economy in the wake of the Great Recession. He and President Obama understood the challenges facing American families because of the struggles their own families had faced earlier in their lives. Joe Biden: “A job is about a lot more than a pay check. It’s about your dignity. It’s about respect. It’s about your place in the community. It’s about being able to look your child in the eye and say, ‘honey, it’s going to be okay,’ and mean it and know it’s true. You never quit on America and you deserve a president who will never quit on you.”

• "Published on Oct 7, 2015: This is the first television ad released by the Draft Biden 2016 Super-PAC, asking Joe Biden to run for President in 2016. The ad highlights how Joe has overcome personal tragedies and his vision for the future in his own words: “We are on the cusp of some of the most astonishing breakthroughs in the history of mankind – scientific, technological, socially. It will be up to you in this changing world to translate those unprecedented capabilities into a greater measure of happiness and meaning, not just for yourself but for the world around you.”

Obama vs. Romney is starting to look like Mac vs. PC, a case of reverse branding

Anybody else notice how political advertising has usually the opposite objective of consumer product advertising?  What I mean is political ads are usually focused on trying to rebrand the candidate's competitor as something negative vs. trying to sell the benefits of their own candidates.  For example, Romney has branded himself as a job creator, but the Obama team is focused on branding Romney as untrustworthy.  

Like any good marketer their anti-Romney campaign keeps pushing 'untrustworthy' as the primary theme or essentially trying to develop a reverse brand equity, and the marketing campaign supports this benefit statement with several different platforms of reasons to believe that help reinforce the equity, such as:

1) Suggest Romney will say anything to get elected and switches viewpoints when its convenient

2) Suggest Romney was responsible for outsourcing US jobs while at Bain

3) Suggest Romney lied about when he left Bain and may have committed securities fraud by doing so

4) Suggest Romney is hiding his money in tax havens because he is refusing to show his historic tax returns

This effort has forced Romney to spend a good portion of his time denying these charges, which just makes him look defensive and less trustworthy, especially because he has stubbornly refused to show his tax returns - the only proof of his innocence.  While its unfair, Romney started his campaign with a deficit of trust, not only because he's running against an incumbent, but also because the reality working against him is that many American's have a mistrust of the Mormon religion because different scares many people even in this day and age.

While I will not openly support or condemn these attacks on trust, the execution of the campaign is brilliant from a marketing strategy standpoint and follows the perfect formula for reverse branding and ingraining the equity/benefit in consumer/voters minds. A clear benefit that strongly resonates, supported by a clear reason to believe, and then when that reason to believe's shelf life expires and it's impact/breakthrough starts diminishing, rotating to new reasons to believe that all ladder back up.

Outside of politics, marketers rarely get a chance to reverse brand a competitor.  Though the best consumer product execution of this strategy was by Apple in their infamous series of Mac vs. PC ads:

Is it just me or is Obama vs. Romney starting to look like Mac vs. PC?  Reverse branding works when supported by enough reasons to believe.

Presidential Symbolism

I'm just as fascinated by presidential politics as I am by brand building. With the upcoming presidential election, I'll be sneaking in the occasional posting on how the candidates are building their own brands, or in both candidates cases partially re-staging their images. As the campaign heats up, pundits will be analyzing every last word the candidates say, while Obama/Romney will each will look to twist the other's misspoken words against them. This got me thinking on the importance of leveraging classic American symbolism to convey a message, while both leaving the pundits no place to run and elevating themselves to Presidential status. To this end, below is a reposting from a blog I started (though only had one post) on election strategery.

ORIGINALLY POSTED ON FRIDAY, AUGUST 20, 2010

Mosque Mess

Overview: On August 13, 2010, the President spoke about the proposal to build a mosque two blocks from the site of the September 11 terror attacks.

What Obama said: "Muslims have the right to practice their religion as everyone else in this country...And that includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan."

These comments have been criticized by many on both republicans and democrats alike because they either disagree with his opinion that the mosque should be built - a CNN poll finds nearly 70% of Americans oppose the mosque - or they worry that his image will take another hit as he becomes further linked with Islam.

While I am one of the 30% of Americans that agrees with Obama and appreciate his want to do the right thing, I believe there was a more appropriate way to address the situation given the sensitivity of the subject.

What Obama Should have Said: "On January 20th, 2009 when I was sworn in as the President of the United States I put my hand on the bible and I took an oath . I took an oath, solemnly affirming that I would preserve, protect and defend the Constitution. And that oath, obligates me to preserve, protect and defend freedom of religion for all Americans."

While the substance of the message is the same, by invoking the power of the presidential oath, the constitution, and finally the bible, Obama's message would have carried more weight. In changing his approach, he would have left less rope for his critics to run with and lifted him above the messy debate.