Politics is a complicated issue. Marketers avoid involving it with their content — and reasonably so. No need to poke the sleeping giant when a lullaby would suffice.
But as the 2016 election cycle dawns, let’s take a moment to reconsider our perceptions of what content can and can’t be. A brand is a brand, whether professional or political, and it’s time for the latter to be taken seriously by businesses.
Content isn’t new to politics. In truth, political campaigns have been content breeding grounds since William Henry Harrison became the first president to run a modern campaign under the slogan “Tippecanoe and Tyler Too” in 1840. The slogan caught on, but Harrison would soon catch pneumonia. He died 32 days into office, survived by his wife, nine kids, and content, too!
So if political content has existed for this long, why haven’t we been talking about it?
What’s Wrong With Political Content?
It’s often poorly done.
Hans Noel, a political scientist at Georgetown University, has this to say about political campaigns: “Politicians and their team of strategists, pollsters, and surrogates wage battle for the votes of the public. Slogans are trumpeted. Gaffes are made. Tactics are deployed. And it probably does not matter all that much.”
Why? Americans spend more money on campaigns than at any point in political history. Cable television offers a wide variety of political programming. At any point in time, you can know a candidate’s height, weight, relationship history, and recreational drug use during his time at Yale.
And it probably doesn’t matter all that much.
Politicians struggle with the same content problem as your C-suite. How does one position himself as a thought leader in a genuine, engaging fashion? Perhaps the problem isn’t always the candidate, rather the strategy by which he’s presenting his platform.
Traditional Political Marketing Approaches
Nigel Jackson, a political scientist at Plymouth University in the U.K., divides political marketing into three strategy subdivisions: transactional, relationship, and experiential.
Transactional marketing focuses on a product that the candidate is trying to sell. Relationship marketing focuses on the encouragement of long-term communication that preserves the elected. Finally, experiential marketing plays to its name.
Content marketers know that a solid campaign accounts for each. Transactions are derived from content-driven leads. Relationship is crucial to the client-account strategist relationship. Experiential marketing is the webinar your company schedules for native promotion.
Notice anything missing from these three approaches? Positioning. And I’m not talking about the left or right of the aisle.
Political scientist Gareth Smith argues that political audiences are similar to business markets. Constituencies, by nature, are skeptical of salesmen. To Smith, political strategy is military strategy. He states, “A strategy is only as effective as its tactical implementation — as politicians bemoaning their inability to communicate on their big ideas will testify.”
A poorly positioned military will get eviscerated. Just ask General Custer, outflanked at Little Bighorn. A poorly positioned candidate won’t get elected. Just ask John Edwards, undressed above a campaign worker. A poorly positioned thought leader won’t be heard. Just ask anyone who ever attempted keyword stuffing.
So how can we graft military strategy onto the world of content strategy?
Form a Contextual Brand
We’re all familiar with candidates posting content to native spaces: their websites, social media feeds, etc. Candidates may even do this in different ways. Jeb Bush’s campaign bio page takes a first-person narrative approach, while Hillary Clinton’s employs the third person. Right or wrong isn’t the question. What matters is why these candidates present themselves this way and how that presentation will be thematically extended throughout the campaign.
Comparative to the content world, native may have been enough in 2008, when Barack Obama owned the Internet at John McCain’s expense. But in 2015, even Bernie Sanders, a 73-year-old senator from Vermont, has a strong native mobile presence. Candidates in this election, and those still to come, must reconsider where they’re sharing their expertise and for whom they’re sharing it.
This understanding is fundamental to the candidate’s brand, the most volatile aspect of his persona. In the lead-up to the 2008 election, Obama was able to construct a brand that said, “Yes we can.” On the contrary, Sarah Palin’s said, “I can see Russia from my backyard.”
Content marketers can empathize with politicians. The morass of media available to consumers makes it hard to cut through the clutter. Forming a strong brand at the onset of business is fundamental to a content firm’s success.
Once a brand is established, it rarely goes away. According to political scientist Margaret Scammell, “The crucial added value of branding is that it provides a contextual structure to link advertising insights of the brand, positioning, development, and promotion. Arguably, branding is now the permanent campaign.”
In short, we may know that client X possesses the solution to a certain problem in healthcare tech. But how do we, as marketers, arrange the context surrounding that expertise to craft a positive, indelible brand?
This questions deals with the “why.” In B2B or B2C marketing, we often ask ourselves “how” and “what,” but rarely do we ask “why.” In a political campaign, “Why?” is the most important question we can pose.
Navigating the “Why”
To navigate the tumultuous “why,” here are a few takeaways we can learn from political campaigns to craft excellent content:
1. Share your story. Before Obama was president, he was the author of two autobiographies. The first step in content creation should be explaining who’s behind the campaign button/expertise. Be honest. Be candid. Be human.
2. Seek out constituent/client pain points. As a content creator, I sit in on sales calls to identify the pain points that my audience is experiencing. Knowing these pain points, I can be assured that I’m crafting empathetic content to help solve them. The same holds true for political content. Don’t presume you know your constituent/client’s struggle — always hold an ear to grassroots feedback.
3. Embrace guest posting. Remember: No one likes a sales pitch. So why not have others do the selling for you? In politics, endorsements are crucial. These external voices can organically introduce you to new audiences while still offering you control over the content you crave.
4. Forget the rhetoric. We get it. America the great was born of freedom and the virgin bald eagle. She rose to a world power on the wings of a republic predestined to annex Guam and claim excess eating as her own. Nobody enjoys rhetoric, regardless of whether you’re a politician or content marketer. If you wish for your candidate/client to be taken seriously as a thought leader, write like one. Not everyone can be Reagan.
5. Go mobile. Epithets about the rise of the Internet are somewhat tired, but there’s one frontier that’s still open for exploration: mobile. During the 2012 presidential election cycle, Obama performed significantly better in polls that included cell phone use. “If you want to reach everyone in America, the best way to do so is not only on their mobile phones, but through text messages.”
6. Take target practice. Millennials are relatively unlikely to pursue civic involvement. Is this because of apathy or because campaigns aren’t properly targeting them? Political campaigns and content campaigns alike struggle to find this market. The time has come to publish, publish, publish and do so strategically. Mobilize an entire generation of voters/consumers by pursuing them through new-age publishers like Facebook and Apple.
7. Don’t give out senators’ personal information. This has nothing to do with content, but it’s not advisable regardless.
Political content is nothing new. But its efficacy can be called into question. As a content marketer, I encourage you to take chances with your clientele. Outside perspectives are valuable in business, even when they come from the politicians we love to hate.
Sources:
Scammell, Margaret. “Political Brands and Consumer Citizens: The Rebranding of Tony Blair.” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 611.The Politics of Consumption/The Consumption of Politics (2007): 176-92. JSTOR. Web. 20 July 2015.
Smith, Gareth. “Competitive Analysis, Structure And Strategy In Politics: A Critical Approach.” Journal Of Public Affairs (14723891) 6.1 (2006): 4-14. Academic Search Complete. Web. 22 July 2015.
Jackson, Nigel. “General Election Marketing-Selling A Can Of Beans, Building A Favours Bank Or Managing An Event?.” Journal Of Public Affairs (14723891) 13.3 (2013): 251-259. Academic Search Complete. Web. 22 July 2015.
Noel, Hans. “Ten Things Political Scientists Know That You Don’t.” The Forum 8.3 (2010): n. pag. Georgetown. 10 May 2012. Web. 20 June 2015.
