gilbert teodoro airs an epic fail tv ad, a push against surveys and himself. Teodoro has ADS? Sindrome!

this is supposed to be part of the arsenal to what an analyst calls to be teodoro’s “Battle Of  The Bulge”, a last ditch, huge effort to turn the tide of failure that seem to be the campaign’s destiny.

that is a good objective. but what we do not find good is this tv ad which seem to be not going for anyone or any principle in particular, it is going against surveys.

contrary to pronouncements by teodoro himself that he does not care about surveys, this ad confirms he does care for surveys. he cares for it so much that he feels compelled to put up an ad that goes against it. the way this execution was laid out, you would think teodoro is going against an opponent named “survey”.

well, he is not. he is however suffering in the surveys. his best rating is 7% and his latest ratings at the SWS is 6%. he has been perennially stuck at 4th. that is definitely not a good thing as it shows he in unable to convince and convert voters to his side.

i thought teodoro will climb to a respectable double digit rating by now, but that seems to be expecting too much considering it is just a few weeks till election time.

this ad is a high risk ad for teodoro. this ad actually calls attention to his poor showing in the surveys. ads, specially political ads, are supposed to highlight the good things a candidate has. this one begins the ad with calling attention to a failure of the teodoro campaign – his very poor showings in the surveys.

we do not know exactly how much of the voters are familiar with the survey results but for those who are not, this ad will push them to find what the surveys are saying about teodoro. and when they do, they will see that teodoro is a loser in the surveys. the net effect then of this ad is that more people will now pay attention to survey results and every time the voters see the results, they will see teodoro doing very poorly at them.

i don’t think there is a single tv ad for any mass consumer product where it begins it’s tv commercial telling it’s target market the brand has a very small market share  or that research shows the brand is not being proffered by many consumers or only a few consumers prefer the brand.

the equivalent message of political surveys to mass consumer brands is that a poor showing in political surveys mean the candidate is not preferred by many voters. that kind of message is hardly any positive motivation to convert non-users or non-preferers to your side.

in fact that kind of message may even demoralize or turn off his current supporters. there are not many people who will want to continue to support a loser.

we understand the intent of including surveys at the beginning of the ad. this ad is meant to show that teodoro is gaining support from a growing number of voters. they want a bandwagon effect.

that is a valid advertising idea. but did they have to use teodoro’s poor showing in surveys to set up the message of growing support for teodoro? did they have to use a negative message at the start of the ad to communicate a positive message?

no, they did not have to. there are many other ways of setting up the commercial.  in fact there a lot more positive ways of doing so.  the negative start of the ad with the message of teodoro’s poor showing in the surveys has the effect of teodoro shooting himself in the foot.

the ad also suffers from other fatal errors, to us the most major of which is the obsession of people saying his name over and over again. teodoro’s problem goes beyond name recognition. getting the people to say his name many times over in the ad is not doing anything to help him get elected.

they should have asked the on-cam talent to tell the audience why they are voting for teodoro rather than just saying his name. they had a few of those but we don’t understand why of all attributes they want people to remember about teodoro, it needs to be “batang-bata” or “maka-Diyos”.

while those are positive attributes, they do not give any meaningful  addition or address problems of the teodoro campaign. rather than give these worthless attributes, they could have chosen attributes that are consistent with his platform or those that debunk negative attribute people have of him. in other words, they should have used attributes or messages that will help him get elected.

this is a definite WAWAM! and yes, teodoro has ADS? Sindrome.

the miracle that teodoro’s campaign wants us to believe will happen

we are reacting to these statements made by the teodoro campaign officials about the chances that that teodoro can still win this election.

source: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/nation/view/20100331-261738/Dont-count-Teodoro-out-yet-says-Palace

Don’t count Teodoro out yet, says Palace
By TJ Burgonio
Philippine Daily Inquirer
First Posted 07:03:00 03/31/2010

MANILA, Philippines—Though he remains a poor fourth in the surveys, administration standard-bearer Gilbert “Gibo” Teodoro should not be counted out of the presidential race, Malacañang said Tuesday.

“There’s no reason for anyone to throw in the towel,” Gary Olivar, deputy presidential spokesperson, told reporters. “People, when they start campaigning, they should be serious about it.”

it is the late stages of the campaign and for teodoro to continue to get only single digits ratings in the poll does say it is time to throw in the towel.

changes in voter attitudes do not happen fast – it takes time for the messages to reach the voters and it takes time for the voters to act on them.

even on that one, there is no assurance that the voters will react  favourably to your message. the other candidates are doing their own efforts which probably already has reached the intended voters.

for those in the laggards group like teodoro, the task is not just to get his message to reach voters, but more than that, it is to convert them to his side.

conversion is one of the most difficult tasks in marketing. conversion is much harder than persuasion.

Olivar advised the public to wait for the results of the next survey, which he said would cover the March 26 kick-off of the local campaign and factor in the political machinery of the administration coalition.

“We have the word of administration party spokespersons and leaders that we will start to see the effects of their grassroots strength after the local campaign started on March 26,” he said.

this is a very tall promise.

the only way teodoro will turn the tide in his favor is he has done something massive, something different and something really smart in the last few weeks since that last poll was taken. we did not see teodoro doing anything earth shaking during the time.

the local “political machinery” is a myth the ruling party keeps saying whenever they are losing in the polls. to them it is really no more than a made up silver bullet.

political machinery did not deliver and in fact was non-existent in the last senatorial election where almost all the opposition candidates won seats and almost all the admin candidates lost.

the reason for the loss? gloria macapagal arroyo. and that reason continue to be present now and in particular with teodoro who has been given the kiss of death.

Party secretary general Francis Manglapus said the surveys would not reflect the true sentiments of voters until 10 days before the end of the campaign period, when the electorate had made a firm choice.

“This thing is far from over,” he said by phone.

Manglapus, who said he doubted the “science” behind surveys, agreed that the surveys had failed to take into account such factors as “command vote” and “regional strength.”

surveys capture voter sentiments at the moment of the survey. have several survey points and you can connect them to form a trend. the trend for teodoro is not a good thing.

“command vote” and “regional strenght” are cute new words to say “political machinery” which as we have said previously is a myth.

it is strange that the impact of political machinery is being portrayed here like a switch or a faucet where it’s effects are felt only when it is switched on.

these local officials who are supposed to form the political machinery has always been in their locality from the very beginning. why has their impact not been picked up by the polls? it appears they have not been doing anything and will only start on the official start of the local campaign.

if the impact of the local machinery is not being felt now, it will not be felt 2 months from now during the election.

“We just started to send out our message last Friday,” he said, referring to the start of the local campaign. “We’re just starting to crank the machinery.”

if this is true, then this party is in trouble for it’s mismanagement and poor strategizing in this election. they knew from the very beginning that teodoro was an underdog in this election. knowing that, the smart manager should have started this much earlier.

Manglapus, however, conceded that the delayed move to air advertisements on television and radio contributed to Teodoro’s poor ratings. He disclosed that the party would step up the airing of these ads and the road shows.

the problem with teodoro’s adveritsing is not just being late in airing them. first of all, we disagree – they were not late at all. they were aired at  about the same time as the other front runner aquino.

the problem with teodoro’s ads is that they were bad commercials and that they do not have enough money to air them. ad people will tell you, however, that even if teodoro had the same amount of money villar ad, it will not help at all since the ads are weak.

“The election is 40 days away, and the local campaign has just started. Now the real movement and growth of our campaign by leaps and bounds will be seen,” he said.

this is fine IF teodoro do not have competition. teodoro’s campaign is not in a vaccum. he competes with other presidentiables. so it will not happen.

the teodoro campaign needs a large dose of reality.

gilbert teodoro’s “battle of the bulge” tv ad – “sulong”

this is next at The 2010 Presidentiables Blog.

gilbert teodoro set to do last minute push for a win, here is why it will fail

gilbert teodoro, the standard bearer of the admin/(supposed) dominant political party LAKAS-KAMPI-CMD know that he is losing this election campaign. he has not moved up in any significant way in the polls, being stuck at a very far fourth in the rankings and getting at best 7% while the front runners are at a staggering 36% for aquino and 34% for villar. it is bad enough that the two front runners are way ahead of everybody, on top of teodoro is estrada who is in the range of 15% , showing strength at that level and even gaining slightly.

the question that teodoro’s campaign needs to answer is this – for him to win, where will he get the votes from? the weakest of the three front runners, erap estrada is not exactly weak. among the presidentiables, estrada is the candidate that has the most experience and time as an elected government official not to mention he was actually elected president once before. teodoro compared to erap looks puny.  if teodoro can’t get pat estrada, how does he expect to get past villar and aquino, the two most popular presidentiables in this campaign?

it is interesting that an article appeared at the PDI yesterday where the teodoro campaign seem to be preparing for what the writer calls a “battle of the bulge” – a last minute, well last few weeks campaign to get teodoro elected. in marketing, it is called a marketing blitz. in a political campaign it’s most likely called a “failed election bid”.

we will be using that article as a pick up point for this post.

The ruling coalition, which enjoys a headlock on 70 percent of local government positions, is pinning its hopes on superior resources and widespread party machinery to swing the tide of battle.

Banking on these advantages, it plans to assert its superiority with carefully synchronized offensives timed at the start of the campaign for local positions on March 26.

this is what party officials call the “political machinery”. it’s supposed to be potent that only the admin/ruling party has a monopoly on. all the party officials, including teodoro are saying that is what will make him win this election. they conveniently forget that in the last senatorial elections, they said the same thing about the potency of THE machinery. the results – almost all the admin/ruling party senatorial best lost in that election while almost all the opposition senatorial bets won the election.

the results of that election was so bad for the admin/ruling party that pichay who spent the most in advertising during that time did not get elected while trillanes who was in jail, unable to campaign and practically had zero advertising money won the election.

the opposition won that election mainly on the basis of the people exercising a protest vote where they elected the opponents of arroyo’s candidates. arroyo at that time was very unpopular and the people have had enough of her so much so that they even said they do not want her candidates to win.

after the election, LAKAS party officials admitted the machinery did not deliver. apparently the local candidates and officials of LAKAS abandoned the admin senatorial candidates when they felt the people were going against them.

the situation then compared to now is about the same – arroyo is unpopular and in fact probably even more unpopular than before. everyone knows teodoro is arroyo’s candidate and based on surveys, voters said they will not elect the candidate that arroyo is endorsing.

we think it’s foolish to rely on the “machinery” to get teodoro elected. the machinery is a myth.

The opening salvo of this make-or-break offensive will be new TV commercials targeting the youth on Monday.

Teodoro’s spokesperson, former Press Secretary Mike Toledo, said the commercials would be aired with frequencies rivaling those of the front-runners, Senators Benigno S. Aquino III of the Liberal Party and Manuel Villar of the Nacionalista Party. Between them, they have spent close to P2 billion, dominating the airwaves, according to the media firm AGB Nielsen.

Teodoro’s ads will zero in on the target segment that the coalition hopes will swing the tide of battle to his side, the youth ranging in age from 18 to 39, who constitute 52 percent of the 50 million voters registered, according to Toledo.

Teodoro has been doing well in mock elections in schools recently. Campaign strategists have selected this key segment to focus on, Toledo says.

political campaigns seem to have a love affair with the youth vote. all of them seem to think that is the key to their success. villar, aquino and villanueva aired tv  ads targeting them. but if you look at the movements of villar’s ratings, it is not the ad that targeted the youth that earned him a lot of points, it’s the other ads that he aired.

aquino with his rap tv ad meant for the youth got mixed  reviews with people liking it and others throwing up hearing aquino do a rap in the tv ad. they abruptly pulled off that ad. villanueva aired one too but that did not help him either.

teodoro did not seem to learn the lessons the other presidentiables learned – they will air an ad targeting the “youth” on monday.  we now think this obsession with youth ad is probably the fault of the admen hired by the campaigns for their ad needs. all of them seem to be saying the same mantra.

maybe teodoro will find the secret weapon in ads for the youth and can get him to win the election. it is good in theory, forgetting for the moment the failures of the other presidentiables, but we think teodoro’s thinking is fatally  flawed.

the critical failure in the ad that will be aired on monday for the youth is the demographics definition – “age from 18 to 39“. the age range is too wide and probably covers at least two distinct groups or even three. the psyche, needs and  attitudes of the 18 year old, a first time voter is very different from a 25 year old who probably has a young family already to someone who is 30 years old who has a not so young family. for sure a 37 to 39 year old is extremely different from an 18 year old, to a 23 year old and a 30 year old.

it is hard for us to understand and we think it is not possible to have an ad meant for the “youth” that will be effective in convincing this wide and un-alike age grouping of 18 to 35 years old.

the admen who sold the idea to the teodoro campaign spoke badly in thinking that an age range as wide as that is a proper segmentation of the target audience. we do not think you will find any adman who will agree to that kind of segmentation.

target audience definition is the very first critical step in developing an effective tv ad. get the definition wrong, or even weak and the ad fails. it will confuse the creative team as it gives them too wide a range with very dissimilar traits and characteristics.

we await this new ad of teodoro. it is supposed to be a miracle tv ad for him. given the potential flaw of the thinking, it will either be a miracle ad or a miracle dud.  we will probably see a WAWAM! on monday.

read PDI article here: http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/inquirerheadlines/nation/view/20100322-260115/Lakas-Kampi-coalition-plans-decisive-Battle-of-the-Bulge

~~~mindscape landmark~~~
carlo arvisu

the curious case of gilbert teodoro cutting ad spending

at the start of official campaign period, gilbert teodoro cut his ad spending to almost zero to only P60T while previous period, he spent a total of P407M, second highest spending to villar’s top spending. (read here : presidentiables spend P2B on advertising. top spenders – villar 1st, teodoro 2nd and aquino 3rd)

we do not understand this move.

teodoro’s poll ratings have been stagnant within the 5% to 7% range since last year. it has not shown any improvement and has kept him at a far 4th with now villar moving up to tie aquino at top place and estrada moving up as well.

with ratings like these, the thing to do is change the ads and increase spending behind it. teodoro has done the exact opposite. he has been going through the provincial rounds but that cannnot compensate for mass media advertising. cutting down on ad spending in this scenario will only see teodoro’s ratings remain the same low 4th to further decline.

makes us wonder:

• is teodoro  not in this campaign to win this  election?
• true to previous “complaints” and pronouncements by himself and edu manzano – their political party lakas-kampi-cmmd has ran out of funds? at the start of the campaign??
• they adapting a miracle strategy where they will do a blitz at the end of the campaign?

need to call oliver stone…..

Teodoro cuts spending on political ads, but not Villar
by Lira Dalangin-Fernandez

INQUIRER.net
First Posted 15:07:00 03/04/2010

MANILA, Philippines – (UPDATE) Presidential candidate and Senator Manuel Villar continues to be the biggest spender of political advertisements at the start of the campaign period last month, already spending some P120 million, according to an advocacy group, citing figures from a media research firm.

In data by AGB Nielsen Media Research from February 9, the start of the official campaign period, until March 2, Villar remained number one among the top five candidates in the presidential race, shelling out P120, 411,093 for 195 minutes of airtime, according to Libertas in its forum Pera’t Pulitika (Money and Politics) Thursday.

Former president Joseph Estrada is second with P88 million for 128.50 minutes, followed by Senator Benigno Aquino III with P87 million for 180 minutes. Senator Richard Gordon is at fourth with P67.3 million for 144 minutes, and in fifth place is administration standard bearer Gilbert Teodoro with P60,480 for 1.5 minutes of airtime, the research firm was quoted as saying.

Among the five candidates, it was Teodoro who considerably cut down on his spending on political ads based on data also from AGB Nielsen, which ranked him second behind Villar, spending P407 million during the pre-campaign months from Nov. 1, 2009 to Jan. 31, 2010. Villar spent P1 billion during the same period.

teodoro set to lose election – teodoro’s own LAKAS-KAMPI-CMD party. giving up on teodoro too soon?

there is something happening within the LAKAS-KAMPI-CMD political party to which gilbert teodoro belongs to –  we are reading noise in the newspapers about several officials of the party openly talking to the press about their discontent and worries on the candidacy of gilbert teodoro. they all seem to be in agreement that teodoro is doing very poorly in this election, that there are things he is doing that is not helping his candidacy and the unsaid words that teodoro is set to lose the 2010 presidential election.

first was senator zubiri’s pronouncement that the opposition is poised to win the 2010 election because teodoro’s campaign never really took off.  he also said this:

“People want change. That is the effect of nine years (in power). That is understandable,” he said in Filipino.

that sounds very much like saying the people are very much tired of president arroyo’s administration and the people can’t wait for her to step down for the new president to take over. it also means teodoro is very much associated with arroyo that the people see the prospect of teodoro being president as just a continuation of arroyo’s presidency.

then there is the statement from another LAKAS-KAMPI-CMD party official who said the party is set to hold an emergency executive committee  meeting in march if teodoro’s ratings fail to improve.

that says the executive committee recognize that teodoro’s campaign is suffering now, unable to get itself out of the bottom in the polls. they are worried of a downward spiral and the emergency meeting is meant to arrest this decline.

just recently, another officer of teodoro’s party has talked to the press also saying teodoro’s advertising campaign, the airplane campaign has failed and is to blame for teodoro’s inability to bring his ratings up from the grave. this officer is LAKAS-KAMPI-CMD vice president prospero pichay.

we find that amusing. pichay ran for senator in the last senatorial election and based on media data, he was the top spender in advertising during that election. as we all know now, pichay lost that election.

we find it ironic that this man who spent the most ad money in the last election but failed to win is making such a comment on teodoro’s tv advertising. it is obvious that not being elected despite being the highest spender in that election means pichay lost the election due to bad advertising. did pichay use his advertising smarts that he ddisplayed in the last election to asssess teodoro’s ad campaign?

the common denominators among these three lakas officials are – teodoro is losing the election and his efforts are not helping him if not wrong.

we are shocked that these supposed officials of the party are even talking to the press about their misgivings and teodoro’s failures as a presidential candidate.  for the sake of teodoro, will they not be better off not talking to the press about these things, keep them hush-hush, hold the meeting and change things.  the key there is not talk to the press.

telling these things to the press can be very demoralizing for teodoro’s few supporters to read. we are ssaying they are few based on the poll results where he got at best 5%. teodoro’s supporters already know their candidate is doing poorly in the polls but to read it in the newspapers as said by party officials is a real killer.

we also wonder if the cracks are showing within the ruling party. this is not the first time it has happened. this already happened from the very beginning of the party’s so called process in selecting their standard bearer.

during that time we heard a lot of officers and members of the party openly criticizing party officials for taking a long time to name their standard bearer. there were also loud talks on who they want the party to select as standard bearer and teodoro’s name was not being mentioned during that time.

with all of these happening to gilbert teodoro’s party, we ask the question – with friends and partymates like these, who needs friends and political opponents?

why gilbert teodoro is losing this election, and it’s not just bad advertising

–this is next in The 2010 Presidentiables Blog–

gilbert teodoro’s cheesy moment in his negative tv ad

teodoro's cheesy moment #1

teodoro's cheesy moment # 2

teodoro's cheesy moment # 3

teodoro's cheesy moment # 4

teodoro's cheesy moment # 5, this time with a smirk

i found this end sequence in that ad really funny. first time i have seen somehting like that done in  a political ad. in fact it is the first time i have seen something like that in any tv ad.

what was the director thinking? hahaha. his way of having a dramatic ending? this kind of ending is okay for a movie or some drama queen but for a presidential candidate? it’s so un-presidential.

~wawam~

negative campaign tv ads : gilbert teodoro did it first & what ferdinand marcos & john mccain have in common with gilbert teodoro

the last time negative advertising was aired in the philippines by politicians was when cory aquino ran against ferdinand marcos in the 80’s, the pre-event to the The People Power EDSA Revolution.

marcos aired ads that depicted cory  as just a “housewife”, saying she does not know anything about running a country. cory of course in truth was just a housewife when she ran against marcos in the election. she did not hold any elective position or any government position before that time. what marcos forgot and the people never did was that cory was the widow of ninoy aquino who was assassinated at the tarmac when he returned home from exile in the US.

a most powerful man in marcos cheating just a housewife in cory in the elections was just too much for the people to take. the people kicked the dictator out of the country and installed the housewife in malacanang.

that negative ad, a first in philippine politics back-fired.

this 2010 election has a kind of negative advertising. this ad was aired by gilbert teodoro.

(read full write up here: gilbert teodoro’s “galing at talino” tv ads – anti-noynoy, anti-humility, generic promises)

in these ads, the announcer voice-over says “dapat lider na hindi lang puso ang alay kung hindi galing at talino“, an obvious reference to noynoy aquino., the expected front runner during the time the ad was first aired.

it is mild and indirect but we do not think anyone missed the reference to aquino. the ad points out aquino’s inadequacy to be president and attempts to discredit the strength of aquino in this campaign.  having  just “puso” was positioned here as not enough or inferior and compared to teodoro’s strength which were enumerated in this ad. the whole ad except for that single line talked about the  credentials of teodoro. it positions teodoro as superior to aquino.

this ad of teodoro is the only political ad in this whole presidential campaign that makes a reference to an opposing candidate and a negative tv ad.

we can’t say for sure that this negative ad of teodoro backfired for him but we do know his ratings at the polls have put him at best 5% while aquino remained the front runner in this election.

we disagree with the way this ad has been done. the attempt at discrediting aquino was too mild and of no consequence in this ad. it’s an ad that is neither here nor there. we think if they really wanted to draw the attention to teodoro’s superiority over noynoy or noynoy’s inferiority to teodoro, they should have gone all the way. doing it in this piecemeal almost forgotten way will not do anything for teodoro but only eat precious seconds. they could have removed that line and the ad would have worked as well. they could have used the freed seconds to add more good qualities of teodoro like having a hot wife or that he drives a BMW 7-series.

in the US negative TV ads are more direct and biting and has no qualms in mentioning the other candidate by name. in fact these ads talk about the opposing candidate and at the end puts to question the other candidate’s credentials or capabilities.

these ads are against barack obama aired by john mccain meant to stop the momentum that obama was enjoying at that time.  negative tv ads are usually aired when an opposing candidate is very much leading in the polls and needs to be stopped. it’s very much like a hail mary pass where close to the election, the candidate airs negative tv ads hoping it will spark a rally  among his supporters and recruit new ones.

results of negative ads are mixed in the US. some worked and brought down candidates and some didn’t. political strategists have always said it is very risky but for a candidate who is not doing well, it is surely very tempting to do. this mccain negative ad against obama obviously did not work.

interestingly enough, these anti-obama negative ads aired by mccain are very much applicable here in the philippines against noynoy aquino or at least that is the negative campaign the presidentiables are saying during debates and press interviews.

are we going to see negative ads soon?

The celebrity backers of Barack Obama say
they are not like Paris and Britney.
[ Los Angeles Times – July 31, 2008 ] :

TO HOLLYWOOD it smacked of desperation.

That’s why the reaction to a new John McCain ad attempting to portray Barack Obama as a kind of mindless celebrity — likening him to Paris Hilton and Britney Spears — drew collective yawns and shrugs of irritation from politically active members of the entertainment industry.

Just for a start, industry types say the ad is wrong: In the Hollywood lexicon, Obama is not a celebrity. He’s a rock star. (Note to McCain strategists: That’s the difference between Jessica Simpson and Bono.)

Then there’s the small inconvenience that Paris’ parents, Rick and Kathleen Hilton, are supporters of McCain’s Republican presidential bid. According to federal campaign records, they gave the maximum $4,600.

No word on their plans for the general election, but this much is certain: Their daughter has never paid to attend an Obama campaign fundraiser. (It’s unclear whether she’s even met the senator, or whether she’s even registered to vote. The same goes for Spears.)

McCain’s latest attempt at discrediting his handsome, photogenic young rival particularly galls stars and executives with a memory, because only eight years ago, McCain was a fixture in Hollywood fundraising circles when he tried to raise money from the very people his ad now ridicules.

presidentiables ad themes: villar-poverty, aquino-corruption, estrada-nostalgia and teodoro-ego trip

as we go to the last few months of the campaign, we see the presidentiables reshaping their campaign themes. in advertising this is called brand positioning. the major candidates have changed their brand positioning that they started with since last year. what we have now may very well be for most of them the positioning that they will have till the end of the campaign period.

manny villar: anti-poverty

manny villar: “all out war on poverty”. villar  has re-shaped his campaign into a theme of anti-poverty. this he actually declared this is what his campaign will take, an all out war on poverty as he put it around the December 27 time.  (read here: manny villar’s “all out war on poverty” platform and manny villar’s “magtatapos ng kahirapan” tv ad – a bold shift in advertising strategy, 5 stars!)

poverty is a key issue not only in philippine politics but more importantly in real life. a significant portion of the philippine population belong to the poor or the DE socio-eco classes. a significantly high proportion of the population are daily wage earners, many don’t even have regular jobs. a large number of families belong to below the poverty line.

aside from the grim statistics and reality, many politicians have won elections on an anti-poverty campaign. in fact most of the politicians do but the most notable winner using this platform is erap estrada.

noynoy aquino – anti-corruption.   in the last few weeks and perhaps as a reaction to his poll ratings softening allowing many villar

noynoy aquino : anti-corruption

to be on a statistical tie, the aquino campaign has focused on “anti-corruption.

corruption just like poverty is a key issue in philippine politics and real life. we see corruption in our daily lives with most of us being victims of it. they may be small for ordinary citizens but we have read in the papers big time corruption scandals.

president gloria macapagal arroyo based on surveys is known as one of the most corrupt presidents of the country since ferdinand marcos. corruption or the suspicion of it, because they are all unresolved will probably be the enduring legacy of arroyo. being under arroyo for 9 years, this is certainly a key issue for the people.

international agencies and think tanks have put corruption at a staggering rate of 25% to 50% in government contracts. that means most of the government contracts are inflated by that rate as that is the rate corrupt officials get out of government projects.

erap estrada – nostalgia and return to power. estrada is asking voters to bring him back to malacanang on the basis of returning him back to office, according to him to allow him to complete his unfinished business which was cut short by a EDSA DOS.

erap estrada : nostalgia

frankly, we do not understand this positioning of estrada. it is one of the weakest among the presidentiables. there is a gross failure in that positioning as this speaks only to estrada supporters which by the time, estrada’s glory days long gone must have shrunk to a small slice.

many of the current voters may not have known what the estrada presidency was during his time. worse, many of them probably know only the bad things, his conviction of plunder more specifically.

appealing to nostalgia means alienating every one else who were not supporters of estrada. they are a minority and getting a minority of votes will not get him elected, a majority will.

this is a WAWAM!

gilbert teodoro – credentials and ego-trip.  we think teodoro’s campaign has suffered the most among all the presidentiables. it has taken a whipping from the get go and continue to make disastrous blunders from the very beginning. quite frankly, we do not think the teodoro campaign has done anything right since it started.

and this positioning of teodoro – an endless propping up of his credentials, even though we are not asking  for it is no more than just an

gilbert teodoro: ego trip

ego trip. we find it strange that an ad for a politician is adapting a positioning of an ego-trip.

teodoro wants us to elect him for his “galing at talino”. teodoro is the only presidentiable who is asking us to vote him based on his personal qualities. all other presidentiables are asking us to vote them for what they will do for the country or what they will solve, teodoro is asking us to vote him for his ego.

his ads endlessly talk about his qualifications, his latest tv ad bragging that he is an accomplished pilot. (read here : gilbert teodoro’s new tv ad “lipad” does not fly, gilbert teodoro’s “galing at talino” tv ads – anti-noynoy, anti-humility, generic promises and gilbert teodoro’s “posible” tv ad – a change of strategy to save his campaign)

this ego-trip obsession  is obvious in teodoro’s tv ads – he enjoys spelling his name in his ads. before the election campaign, when he was still DND chief,  teodoro aired a disaster preparation ad that had his messages spelling out his last name T-E-O-D-O-R-O. (read here:  gilbert teodoro’s tv ad – promises made, promises broken)

we are not surprised to note that his selling line, “Galing At Talino” also spells out his initials. that is incontrovertible proof that teodoro is on an ego-trip positioning.

will an ego-trip positioning appeal to voters? apparently not as we see teodoro’s poll ratings remain at disastrous levels, 4% to 5% at this late stage of the election campaign.

this is a WAWAM!

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up next at The 2010 Presidentiables Blog are the positioning of the laggard presidentiables.

gilbert teodoro’s new tv ad “lipad” does not fly

there is something wrong with this tv ad of gilbert teodoro. it’s that part from the start of the ad to the end of the ad.

gilbert teodoro has positioned himself in this election as the “galing at talino” presidentiable but in this ad, tedooro chooses his hobby, being a pilot as the over-all theme of the ad. of all things about teodoro, he chose the one credential that seem to be the least among his many credentials that are much more substantial.

we have nothing against pilots but we are not sure people know pilots can be good at running a country. we also doubt that his intended audience know a lot about being a pilot nor is it a career that is aspirational to them and enough for them to be convinced to vote for teodoro.

the ad actually talks about the economy. as a tie-in to the pilot concept. the ad talks about teodoro’s promise to push the country into an economic take-off.

and that exposes more problems in this ad, in fact we think it is a much more major error in this ad. people definitely will not associate pilots with the economy of a country much more the idea that we need a good pilot to push the country into an eco take-off.

it is bad enough that most people know little about economics, this ad added another ambiguity into it by saying someone who is a good pilot will be able to push the economy into a take-off. the ad may have attempted to explain, but we don’t get it.

what burdens this ad is the topic they chose. the economy is an invisible idea to most, but to choose economic take-off as the specific discourse is like drinking a glass of water knowing there is poison at the bottom of the glass.

teodoro towards the end of the ad says we are ready for a take-off but in reality we are not. in fact the philippines is far from even being ready for a take-off and many steps removed at an actual economic take-off.

we think what happened here is the ad agency and/or the teodoro campaign wanted the economy as the topic. then they probably said they should not just talk of the economy in general as it might be a boring tv ad and does not offer very much differentiation versus the other presidentiables. so they decided to use ‘economic take-off” as the topic, a sexy topic in economics.

then the creatives probably complained. eco take-off is a very complex topic to explain in a 30 second tv ad and a boring one. they needed some creative handle to make the ad more interesting to the audience. and that is how they found teodoro’s hobby of being a pilot as the creative handle.

they must have said – voila! we found the magic potion. in their minds, it really was perfect – being a pilot is unique to teodoro among his rivals, its kinda sexy, he flies planes, planes do a take off and the topic is eco take-off! what a great find!

imagine that, all the words and concepts match perfectly. it will also allow the creatives shots of huge plane, controls and a literal take-off of the plane. just perfect.

yes, it is perfect in their world. but we think not in the real world of advertising where it needs to be aired to a general audience.

in their excitement and unending celebration of finding the right formula with a perfect fit, they forgot they pushed their candidate’s image from lofty and aspirational to mediocre and hohum that most of the people will not find fascinating.

this is the formula they used, but forgot it is something that will not take-off in the minds of voters : good pilot = good president.

this ad is a WAWAM!

gilbert teodoro’s “posible” tv ad to be pulled off the air to avoid copyright infringement issue with rico blanco

gilbert teodoro announced his tv ad “posible” which has the song composed by rico blanco and mired in controversy on copyright infringement will be pulled off the air.

this is a wise move. we have written previously that the campaign does not need this kind of controversy, it removes the focus of the campaign on more important things, like winning the election.  (read here: rico blanco vs. gilbert teodoro on copyright infringement – teodoro should pay up and revise his tv ad)

in our view, the teodoro campaign must have felt rico blanco have grounds and can very well file a copyright infringement lawsuit on him and on the campaign. they may win it ot lose it but it is not worth the time and effort.

we think someone screwed up big time on this error. the communication team of teodoro and it’s advertising agency should own up to the blunder. it would be just right if teodoro fired some of his staff and the ad agency for the putting the campaign in such a bad light.

they could actually revise the ad and put in a different music to this ad. the rico blanco song is not material to the ad. although we are not a fan of the (read: gilbert teodoro’s “posible” tv ad – a change of strategy to save his campaign), replacing the song in it will save the campaign some production money versus producing a brand new tv ad.

as some kind of coup, they could actually commission rico blanco to write a brand new song for the ad and that would sit very well for the audience, rico’s fans and rico himself. it twill be talked about and in a good way.

January 7, 2010

Meanwhile, Teodoro announced yesterday that he has already ordered the withdrawal of one of his television advertisements using the tune of “Posible” by Rico Blanco.

 “We have pulled it out so there would be no more legal debates. But they should not say we did not have the right” to use the song, he said.

Teodoro maintained that they obtained the rights from a certain Greg Garcia to use the song.

http://www.philstar.com/Article.aspx?articleId=541395&publicationSubCategoryId=65