Nearly two years of election mania comes to a climax today. Get out and vote and celebrate the end of election year marketing (or start prepping for 2012). This has been an incredible year for election marketing and the church could learn a thing or two.
While churches can learn a lot from the pricey presidential campaigns, they may find more in common with the low budget local campaigners. Either way, see if your church can glean a few lessons from the political marketers:
- Marketing lessons from the U.S. election by marketing guru Seth Godin.
- McCain vs. Obama on the Web.
- Yours truly looks at specific campaigns and determines that Election Marketing Sucks.
- Marketing pundits have been hailing the Obama campaign machine for months, so here are two quick examples: Why the Obama Brand is Working and Obama’s Viral Marketing.
- And for added fun, MTV points out freebies for voters (though it’s illegal in some places).
And don’t forget to vote!
Charlie
November 4, 2008
I’m so glad you noticed this too. Obama’s campaign has been marketed extremely well. Especially on the web. He had everything, even an exclusive application for the iPhone/iTouch. The only thing we probably shouldn’t learn is the whole mudslinging thing… yeah, not cool.
sean
November 4, 2008
the interesting thing about election advertising, it helps to have a devil. the adversary. the evil one.
hellfire and brimstone.
me, though, i don’t think the devil is all that relevant for us.
the thing that is interesting about obama ads, though, in particular, is how convinced people seem to be that this will change things. me, i’m a bit of a non-believer about any kind of political salvation. but you’ve got a bunch of people out there convinced that this ticket will usher in some brave new world (no literary allusion intended).
the sense in this election of a lost world teetering on the edge of destruction, and a willful announcement to that world that there is a different course that people need to choose. that everyone needs to choose. that people need to make that decision today, or risk something horrible happening.
nah, the more i think about it the less i can see any sort of learnings.
aaron
November 4, 2008
The one thing that churches can REALLY learn from election marketing is how to really annoy people and the uselessness of a yard sign with the candidates name on it.
I mean seriously, this is the time of year I choose to leave my TV off as much as possible.
Kirt
November 4, 2008
I think election-time marketing proves that with enough money you can make anything seem true.
PJ Comi
November 4, 2008
Good post
http://selfpromostuff.blogspot.com
Donny-MarketingTwin #2
November 5, 2008
I think the use of Obama’s logo has set the standard now. Bush got the ball rolling with the “W” in 2000/2004 but now a candidate might need more than just some cool fonts and a red/white/blue background with a wavy flag as their campaign icon. Fascinating to see how social media has played a role this year from the Obama groups to even Mike Huckabee’s use of social media. Interesting to see where 2012 will have us.
Jeff Goins
November 5, 2008
What’s funny is that I thought I was being original this morning in blogging about what we can learn from the Obama campaign regarding marketing. Oh, silly me. Good post; great point. Loved Godin’s bit about what to learn from Obama’s campaign. Couldn’t agree more. If nothing else, we have to agree – good marketing works. Bad marketing, well, sucks.
gavin
November 5, 2008
some local nashville folks did an analysis of the obama campaign’s use of social media and tried out the principles and they worked for them. you can see their brain trust at http://www.barack20.com/