bad advertising decisions will cause noynoy aquino to lose this election

if noynoy aquino loses this election, it will be because of the bad advertising decisions the aquino campaign has made. if  aquino loses, villar will win who on the other hand would be winning the election because of excellent advertising decisions.

first, we have been a fan of aquino’s tv ads. (read here: https://2010presidentiables.wordpress.com/category/noynoy-aquino-tv-ads/). we think the first ad, hindi ka nag-iisa as the first aquino ad was perfect in setting the tone and direction of the aquino campaign. there was a lull after that first ad, then they released a new ad “Hindi ako magnanakaw” which on its own as well we thought was a very good ad. this ad defined aquino in a more specific manner, something very appropriate coming from the first ad.

as individual ads, they were very good ads. but from a campaign stand point and most specially from a political campaign point of view, what they did may have been big failures. it is this sentence in the paragraph, above that spells the failure in the aquino campaign – “there was a lull after that first ad”.

noynoy aquino will not lose this election due to the ads he has released, he will lose it due to the ads the campaign did not release at those times when it mattered. we think the failure of the ad campaign of aquino was on the error of “not doing anything” or abstention.

aquino at the polls from the very start was very impressive. in the first SWS poll where respondents were asked the top three people who will be good enough to be replace arroyo, aquino got a very impressive 60%, september 2009.

other polls that followed from SWS and pulse asia that asked specifically for presidential preferences (as opposed to 3 who can best replace arroyo) placed aquino as the dominant front runner at 44% to 47% with villar a  very far  2nd spot in some cases not even half of aquino’s ratings.  recent polls from SWS and Pulse Asia, however puts villar now at a statistical tie with aquino. villar’s kept going up while aquino softened and finally broke down in the latest poll.

what happened during that period from the start to that time that villar caught up with aquino? villar sustained his high spending in media and in fact at some point even increased spending  and he kept changing his ads to talk about various issues and messages. aquino on the other stayed put and did not move an inch. aquino continued to air nothing but  his initial “hindi ka nag-iisa” ad through those weeks when villar kept changing his messages. all that aquino did was he edited down the 2 minute ad into 30 second spots. he did not change his message on the air.

and that is what we think had hurt aquino – his ad campaign’s decision not to evolve and not to do anything versus an aggressive opponent in villar who not only outspent aquino by a mile, villar kept changing his messages or brand positioning.

a good description – nakatulog sa pansitan ang ad agency ni aquino.

while the ad agencies may apply mass consumer marketing principles in their advertising of the candidates, one principle that does not work in political ads is not changing messages. most mass consumer products will not change their ads and strategies for a time. that does not apply to political ads.

what the aquino campaign did not understand is that politics is a very different kind to that mass consumer products advertising.  in the arena of politics, issues and therefor thinking change rapidly and they can change often. consumer habits and attitudes may not change for mass consumer products for quite sometime (you shampoo your hair the same way for years), but not in politics.

national and political issues pop up very often, possible even in just a few days time. timely response to that change is of utmost importance to candidates who want to win an election, specially those running for president, a national position.

also, ad campaigns have a build up effect in politics. political ads more than mass consumer advertising shape the political minds of voters. with many national issues being put into the table, new ones introduced, old ones die out, the whole is always a composite of what has been put there.

that is what villar was able to achieve and something aquino failed at. villar with his changing messages was successful at implanting various messages on many issues in the minds of the voters that eventually formed into a strong composite whole. aquino with his sparse media weights (compared to villar) and few messages was unable to form any meaningful mass in the minds of the voters.  

the net effect of that is that villar was slowly converting aquino supporters. without a meaningful fight from aquino, they were easy target for villar’s messages, thus the conversion.

we think it is very clear – if aquino loses the election, it will be the fault of his advertising campaign that never was. aquino will lose this election by default in advertising.

~~  a mindscape landmark – carlo arvisu ~~

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please read the latest: noynoy aquino to lose the election due to advertising blunders

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