It's A Political Digital World Part 2

Two days ago I wrote a post called It's A Political Digital World Part 1 and I owe you Part 2.  No post yesterday because I'm spending some time redesigning the website - it is time for a face-lift and my fellow bloggers over the The Marketing Profs Daily Fix seem to concur (see comments section).  Ok, well time to pay you back for sitting so patiently.

The Washington Post article describes at the beginning and end how incumbents can communicate with current constituents to start conversations now and use the list of emails or phone numbers later.  And, best of all these initiatives are coming from the tax payer's dime (BTW - most of the article has little to do with technology and more to do with handicapping the mid-term elections).  Towards the end, the article describes the tools that Republican Steve Chabot has at his disposal.

Chabot is using money that normally would have been spent on junk mail communicating with his constituents and instead is using it to send out emails and building virtual townhalls to understand what issues are important to his voters.  He then could catalog their contact information and use email/telemarketing micro-targeting to remind potential voters of the issues that are important to them. 

Basically this means that he would invite people from his district into what I'm guessing is a moderated forum and then capture name, email, phone number from the people in the chat room.  He could then build a list of which issues are important by person and then re-market to them later on all while using tax payer money.  This is a very powerful use of direct marketing and something that is not possible with direct mail; plus it is DIRT CHEAP.

See it is fast becoming a world of communications, social marketing, and user generated contact.  Now, what would I do with this information and how would I advise some of my political clients?  Simple.  Here's what I'd suggest

1. Ask why You DM - Sure there are "old" models that show if you mail X number to Y targets you'll get donations and votes. But, ask yourself do these models still hold?  Is DM really the best way to reach all potential voters?  For a segment of the populations I'm sure it is, but their number is dwindling.
2. Build You Email List Now And Don't Stop- Sure you can buy a list of voters and this is a good start, but you need to continually figure out ways to generate email.  The above example is a great way to build a very targeted email list, but that's not enough.  Keep asking for an email and test out a lead generation program.
3. Don't Ignore Online Video - The YouTube example from the other day is just one use of video.  Online video is hot and you know the best thing about it?  You guessed it, you know how many times someone ACTUALLY watched the video.  No more guessing and it could be free if placed on a site like YouTube.  Plus, if you have a banner campaign, you could stream the video (more on the use of video in political banner ads hopefully next week).  You could also host your own online video show to capture attention and possibly fly under the radar because not every candidate's tracking is at the same level.
4. Get Involved in The Community - Most politicians have a blog, but how many of them are really involved?  Maybe you are afraid to actually participate and if that's the case than you need to monitor what is happening.  I've seen two products that can monitor the chatter on the internet or in blogs.  First there is RelevantNoise started by my friend Dan Lynn that lets you track and trend positive and negative blog comments.  The second one where another friend of mine works named Jeaneen Andrews is called TrendIQ which tracks overall news.   In fact, the folks over at TrendIQ are tracking the wannabes for the 2008 election.  For example, check out this Google Trend chart that clearly shows news momentum for Lynn Swann in the PA governor race at the same time Swann's google search volume has leveled off and now he is in a tie with Ed Rendell.
5. Online Advertising Is A No-brainer - Search and display ads that are in sync with the traditional advertising should be a lay-up.  They cost less, are much more trackable, demonstrate results, and you can buy on the spot where people get their news.  Seems like a no-brainer.

See, the political advertising model is changing with user generated content, social networks, and on the fly news reporting.  The above are just a few ideas and if you add in the myGOP website, you can see some campaigns evolving.  Now id the time for testing and learning new techniques before your competition does; that way you don't end up in a gun fight with a feather.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric