In the past, I've noted how media relations folks can learn a thing or two from political campaigns. Seven years later there's still truth to this post.
The approach to messaging, and changing it via instant feedback, is smart. And it's even easier to do in 2010 thanks to things like social media. But this year, when more is being spent on political advertising than was spent in the 2008 presidential elections, I've also witnessed what not to do.
And endless number of robocalls to my phone and to my mobile phone, attack ads saturating TV and radio as my mailbox overflows with a serious waste of paper. Even YouTube preroll ads are of a political nature right now.
Why?
Studies show this noise pollution works. And maybe that's what angers me the most.
I'm not going to give you examples of what NOT to do when it comes to media relations lessons in a political campaign. Those lessons are obvious.
And to be clear, this has nothing to do with any political party. It is about all politics. But I do hope you will rock the vote tomorrow. And leave the polls relieved knowing we'll settle back down to the usual 34GB of messages a day.
My name is Kevin Dugan. And I approve of this message.
Insofferenza all'Uso uploaded by Alessandro Pinna
I agree that the barrage of electronic voices and emails are really annoying. It's sad that politics resort to that to get attention and people's votes.
ReplyDeleteStill, it's pretty sad that people need to be continuously reminded to vote and our voter turnout is still ridiculously low.
It is dismaying that this approach repeats continuously like a broken record every election cycle.
Hopefully.. maybe if the audience tuned out all the negativity, the noise pollution would stop?
The real tragedy is that while "noise pollution works," it distorts the nature of democracy. Many voters are too distracted by the "noise" to take the time to research candidates or issues. Therefore the message that candidates are trying to get across are often lost. This is but one of the many media relations failures that take place in an election year. If politicians wanted to really communicate, they would stick to their messages and make sure the audience hears them. Alas, good public relations campaigns are often at odds with getting a candidate elected.
ReplyDelete@ChrisOsche