Last Friday, May 8, 2015, an important article by J.P. Moran was posted in the Washington Times — here is the bioline attached at the end of the piece: “J.P. Moran is the CEO of Blue Wave Marketing and a 20-year marketing veteran.”
The title of it is “How second tier GOP hopefuls could win,” and here are a few excerpts. They will sound familiar to anyone who has been reading what I’ve been writing for years.
President Obama famously said to Mitt Romney during a 2012 debate concerning Russia, the “1980s are now calling to ask for their foreign policy back…” Right now, that phrase rings true for many of the current GOP candidates’ messaging and marketing strategies.
The 1980s are calling, and they want their campaign marketing plans back.
That’s why 2016 is anyone’s race.
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Breaking out in 2016 will take something out of the ordinary. The challenge becomes standing out in a wide field of conservatives whose overall conservative values and core messaging remain largely similar.
These candidates need a revolutionary approach to their messaging, marketing, and use of the latest digital technology. In 2008 and 2012, Republicans got their clocks cleaned by effective internet marketing, and that failure fit the Democrats’ caricature of the GOP: out-of-touch, stale, and outdated.
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One idea conservative candidates should embrace is to learn from cutting-edge businesses and embrace the concept of inbound, or content, marketing. In brief, this has replaced outbound, or traditional interruptive marketing, as it leverages rich, interesting and compelling content to attract an audience to your message, rather than just shouting it out or hitting the campaign trail with the typical and expected political attack ads.
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While we’re talking about elections here, and not selling for a profit, there’s little difference between selling a product or selling a political candidacy. In both cases, the audience’s media engagement habits are the same, whether the goal is selling a product or driving votes for a candidate. In both cases the audience is either using their wallet or their vote to obtain a desired outcome.
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As the debate and frequent news interviews start, more voters will see chopped up clips online than will tune in to watch full events on broadcast television. Investing in team that knows how to create consumable, compelling content across a variety of media channels could ignite a breakout candidate.
Any current GOP candidate who thinks more like a cutting-edge brand, markets themselves like a business, and whose message breaks through and resonates with the audience will have a shot at winning this campaign—even those candidates who at this moment seem like they are second-tier.
You can read Moran’s entire article here.
Image credit: pixabay.com.
