Interruption campaigning is easy. Invitation Based Campaigning is hard.

Easy doesn’t win elections.

Introducing:

OnDemandCampaigning: Instant Fireside Chats For a Search Engine World

Interruption Based Marketing: or “Push” Media

TV, Radio, Newspaper, Direct Mail, Door Hangers, (Interns with bumper stickers ;-)

The Good:

Easy, Well Known, Used for General Awareness and Image Building, Buying & Production
Channels in Place, Comfortable, Controllable, Wide Penetration, Etc. (Easy)

Not So Good:

People tune in to watch CSI or they pick up a paper to read about last night’s game or they listen
to Radio for the music, traffic or news.

We then pay for the rights to interrupt that information flow for :30 or :60 seconds or with a big print Ad that sits next to the reason they were there in the first place. (Sitting next to the popular kid, doesn’t make you popular.)

We then use that stolen attention to talk about our “product” (candidate) or her perspective on issues at a time potential voters or “consumers” may not be receptive to hearing the message.

If they even get our message.

- The Tivo Monster is Growing Stronger.
- Network television ratings continue to stumble.
- Daily Newspaper Readership is dying quicker than most expected.
- FM radio is being threatened by commercial free in-car audio devices such as MP3
players, next generation cell-phones and XM Satellite Radio.

And no one is clear on exactly which, if any, can reach the 18-35 crowd.

This form of “traditional” marketing, serves its purpose and is not going away.

However it is;

Regulated,
Expensive,
Increasingly Difficult to Reach Mass Due to Audience Fragmentation,
Impossible to Tailor Messages to Individual interest or “hot buttons”

Pushing a Message is Still Easy.
But "Easy" is getting less effective and more expensive.

2006 – all about “Pull” baby!

Invitation Based Marketing:

Internet, Search Engines, Blogs, Downloads, Podcasts, Online Video – Fireside Chats for a new generation.

Traditionally, we Push our carefully crafted message, as many times as we can afford to at as many and track the response.

We Push it, track it, measure it, adjust it, and Push it again.

How are we polling? Always a “jump first, hope for the best, jump again” cycle.

No one is suggesting that will or should go away.

But interactive, real time communications and measurement can help enhance the effectiveness of the method.

“You better have that warm bread on the shelf
when the shopper smells it in the oven…”
Andreas Hoffman, German Baker and Pastry Chef

Recently, I spoke to a man who owns a firm that he said was built on the principles of the “On Demand Marketer.”

He told me he “helped widget sellers” to be found by “widget buyers” at the exact moment the buyer was interested. Not before. Not after.

He told me that with a “brand name widget” like Arnold, “pushing” out the sales points the administration chooses to deliver in 2006 would be pretty easy.

(Insert clever Jimmy Orr joke here… “Easy! Obviously this man had never experience a campaign manager call at 2 in the morning on a Sunday…ha, ha, ha…)

However, positioning that message to be found online when voters actually wanted to hear his message was a much different thing.

If Arnold’s “bread” isn't "on the search engine shelf" when voters are interested, they won't buy in 2006.


It turns out the people really are doing their political “shopping” online…

In 2005, 39.8% of Internet users agreed that going online can give people more political power, up from 27.3% the previous year.

61.7% of respondents, Internet users and non-users alike, said that going online (for candidate information) has become important to political campaigns.

Source: Surveying the Digital Future," a report from the USC Annenberg School,

The study’s most interesting point was this…

Of the users who went online seeking campaign information September 2004, 77.4% were looking for information on issues and candidates about which they were undecided.

77%… that is a huge number of “shoppers” asking for a reason to vote for your candidate.

Any marketer, political or other, must recognize that as prime attention real estate.
One-on-one, by request, attention.


A potential, Fireside Chat ala’ Google.


As of July 2005, Nielsen/NetRatings reports an estimated 4.5 billion searches are happening each month.

Over 46% of them belonged to Google, with Yahoo a close second followed by a distant “but growing” MSN.

SearchEngineWatch.com reported that 22.6 percent of search engine users don’t look past the first few search engine results returned. An additional 18.6 percent stop after reading the entire first page of results.

That makes more than 41% of users that simply will not see your message if you don’t have prime, Page-1, Attention Real Estate.

Search By The People, For The People

Lynn Swann and Team 88:

“Recent independent polls have Mr. Swann and Mr. Scranton well ahead of the other GOP contenders, although the undecided column outpolls all of them at this relatively early stage of the race.”

A December survey conducted by Quinnipiac University, which showed Mr. Swann as the choice of 31 of the Republican questioned compared to Mr. Scranton's 23 percent; 5 percent for Mr. Piccola, 2 percent for Mr. Panyard and 37 percent undecided.

(Source: Politics editor James O'Toole can be reached at jotoole@post-gazette.com)

A brief examination of the "hot issues" as the candidates see them, seems to be based in the following concepts:

1. lower taxes
2. school property tax
3. “millage” system
4. reformed property tax system

Other concepts likely to be on the minds of Pennsylvanian voters…
1. Incumbent Gov. Ed Rendell
2. Mr. Swann’s active role in Republican politics, having campaigned extensively for President Bush in the 2004 election.
3. Support from: Mark Holman, who was former Gov. Tom Ridge's chief of staff, and former state chairman Alan Novak.
4. Mr. Swann’s involvement as corporate board member of the H.J. Heinz Co. as well as Hershey Entertainment and Resorts Inc. and Wyndham International Inc.


Looking at these key concepts as invitations to engage the voters when they are asking for more information on these or related topics is where pull-messaging comes into play…

What we know:

These terms…

1. pennsylvania's governors race 2006
2. Lynn Swan
3. Sen. Jeff Piccola
4. Bill Scranton
5. James Panyard
6. Gov. Ed Rendell
7. lower taxes
8. school property tax
9. millage system
10. reformed property tax system

"Live" searching. These terms (includes “related” terms as well)are actually being searched now... (We found another 160)

1. pennsylvania's governors race 2006
2. Pennsylvania
3. governor
4. pennsylvania
5. 2006
6. news
7. politics
8. GOP
9. us news
10. erie
11. senate
12. pa politics
13. scranton
14. D.C.
15. crystal ball
16. Philadelphia
17. exits
18. philadelphia
19. Ed Rendell
20. pittsburgh
21. politicspa
22. United States of America
23. Piccola
24. allentown
25. electionspa
26. keystone politics
27. politics is a good thing
28. pennsylvania politics
29. Horse Racing
30. university of virginia
31. political studies
32. election 2004
33. larry sabato
34. civics education
35. Sports
36. Republicans
37. larry j. sabato
38. club
39. group
40. community
41. event
42. center for politics
43. Republican Party
44. uva center for politics
45. Indiana
46. California
47. Fox News Channel
48. FOX News Channel
49. fox news
50. Foxnews
51. Rendell
52. local
53. fnc tv
54. business
55. senator
56. industries
57. industry
58. lynn swann
59. channel 2 news online
60. online news
61. cbsnews online
62. fn
63. in
64. foxnews.com
65. world news
66. cbs news
67. localnews
68. fox news cable
69. pennsylvania governor
70. news articles
71. cbs news online
72. fnc
73. become
74. A
75. 1995
76. -
77. Texas
78. DeWine
79. New Jersey
80. the
81. first
82. politician
83. Governor
84. Maryland
85. who
86. could
87. National Football League
88. WASHINGTON
89. Gov
90. Jeffrey Piccola
91. William Worthington Scranton
92. William Scranton
93. Lynn Curtis Swann
94. Michael Morrill
95. cbsnews
96. Lynn Swann
97. FOOTBALL
98. Pittsburgh Steelers
99. black
100. Republican
101. Bruce Castor
102. nearly
103. katrina
104. Dave Baker
105. Senat
106. Green Party
107. election
108. Sandals
109. vote
110. majority
111. News
112. Gubernatorial
113. Senate 2006
114. open
115. incumbent
116. Channel 4 Action News
117. Pennacchio
118. Santorum
119. Catherine Baker Knoll
120. Governor of Pennsylvania
121. 2011
122. Pennsylvania gubernatorial election
123. 2007
124. Election
125. Candidate
126. Bob Casey Jr
127. Robert Casey Jr
128. Featherman
129. Bob Casey
130. elect
131. conservative opinions
132. republican news
133. 2006 primary
134. schwarenegger
135. Politics News
136. ehrlich
137. 1971
138. owens
139. 1978
140. 1985
141. 2003
142. 2002
143. elections
144. races
145. Abram Stevens Hewitt
146. 1965
147. 1944
148. issue
149. ohio
150. eletcion
151. seat
152. conservative news
153. congress
154. bush
155. Lieutenant Governor
156. Jeff Piccola
157. control
158. republican
159. democrat
160. 1986

(Source: Overture keyword look uo tool)

Collectivly, these terms are far too wide and varied to be considered true invitations to engage.

Focusing on just the top terms likely to be key for Mr. Swann

• Pennsylvania’s governors race 2006
• Lynn Swan


We found:

648,000 “Pennsylvania” related searches on the Yahoo Search Network for the month of December.

Of greatest interest to these searchers, and potential voters:

pennsylvania
pennsylvania lottery
pennsylvania attorney
university of pennsylvania
pennsylvania map
pennsylvania lawyer
lancaster pa
pittsburgh pa
erie pa
philadelphia pa
pennsylvania law
pennsylvania real estate

a. Other popular issues were

“Health insurance”
“Child Care”
and “education”.

None of which are being talked about by the candidates much at this point. (Maybe a good tip on what matters to these voters?)

Interestingly, and encouragingly for Mr. Swann, almost 1/4th of the “Lynn Swann” related searches last month were in relation to his Governor’s race, not his football career.

There were already more than 2,000 requests for information, just from Yahoo. Add Google and MSN and you could easily triple that number.

There were over 1,600 “Pennsylvania Governor” related searches.

However, when looking for Swann’s election site on Google and using the terms here

Pennsylvania’s governors race 2006
Lynn Swan
lower taxes
school property tax
“millage” system
reformed property tax system

Their site only shows up on page 1 Google for “Lynn Swann”

Huge missed opportunity.

We can fix this.
(Someone should)

Jim Bonfield
Internet Marketing and Search Engine Campaigning