Getting the votes: the marketing game changes.

• Author: Hall, Robert
• Position: Marketing Solutions

For those of us in the marketing game, the presidential election provides a window into the tools of our trade as applied to politics. After all, whether in politics or business, as marketers we are all in the business of getting votes. Political marketing is changing--text messages are now used to inform supporters of the selection of a vice presidential selection, attack ads are released within hours of the events of the day and such. Most estimates predict well over $1 billion will be spent on the 2008 presidential election campaign. The raw economic and marketing resources required to elect our president is sobering.

The election will come to an end the first week in November, but it is not too early to look at five macro marketing trends we've seen play out this political season.

Bottoms-up, local organizing gains momentum. In the Democratic primary Barack Obama introduced a bottom-up, local organization that contrasted sharply from Hillary Clinton's organization, which was driven more centrally--from the top down. Obama was quoted in Time magazine (June 5, 2008) saying, "As somebody who had been a community organizer ... I was convinced that if you invited people to get engaged, if you weren't trying to campaign like you were selling soap but instead said, 'This is your campaign, you own it, and you can run with it,' that people would respond and we could build a new electoral map."

Likewise, when fund raising, Obama devoted more of his schedule to "small-dollar" events. Time described it this way: "The way organizations sprang up organically in almost every congressional district in the country meant that by the time Obama's field organizers arrived in a state, all they had to do was fire up an engine that had already been designed and built locally." This bottoms-up, local approach seems more attuned to today's marketplace, where people are often skeptical of institutional organizations and entrenched leadership.

Money is necessary, but guarantees nothing. In the Republican primary John McCain early on ran out of money, lost key campaign leadership, and seemed to be in shambles. Yet he came back and won his party's nomination. Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee had very little money to spend, yet exceeded the delegate count of Mitt Romney who spent over $100 million dollars during his campaign. The irony is that while money is very much a requirement, it is nonetheless does not guarantee results. As Romney can attest, you cannot...