Daang Matuwid failure – after 7 months, Roxas reaches only 4th and flat in the polls

Mar Roxas’ presidential campaign is unique – it is the only campaign that has single-mindedly stayed on one platform and advertising campaign since it launched in end July, 2015 with the formal endorsement of President Noynoy Aquino at Club Filipino. Roxas has stayed on “Daang Matuwid” since that formal endorsement. In the words of Aquino, Mar Roxas will “continue Daang Matuwid”.

With that announcement, Roxas got a huge bump in the polls, surging from a single digit rating to a double digit rating. That was in September 2015 where his rating at Pulse Asia stood at 18% making him a legitimate contender among the presidentiables. The surge placed Roxas at 3rd and very close to Jejomar Binay who was at 2nd, That was the first time that Roxas placed strongly in the polls.

But that surge in September 2015 was the last good news Roxas has gotten in the polls. For seven (7) months since September 2015 that Roxas has stayed on “Daang Matuwid” , Roxas has not gotten any good news in the polls.

After seven (7) months, Roxas is still 4th out of 5 candidates and his ratings has remained flat, just moving within the range of 17% to 20%, close to being within the margin of error. Being within the margin of error means the differences in his ratings are not significant, his numbers have not really changed.

 

 

This means “Daang Matuwid” is associated with failure, the most that it has given Roxas in the last seven (7) months of being single-minded on it is 4th place that is not moving at all. fourth place in an election will not win it.

In marketing and advertising an ad campaign or a brand positioning that is not delivering the results, like a rise in market share or an uptick in volume sales, is immediately dropped and changed into something else.

This action of dropping and changing ad campaigns and brand positioning is even more dire in a political campaign. A political campaign is short, lasting just months and has a definite deadline – election day. Not getting it right by election time means losing the election.

Mar Roxas’ “Daang Matuwid” for sure is a WAWAM!

Read also :

• why Mar Roxas’ “Daang Matuwid” ad campaign is failing http://wp.me/pnw03-1Z5

• Mar Roxas’ “Daang Matuwid” ad campaign is failing him – the numbers show it http://wp.me/pnw03-1YE

 

why Mar Roxas’ “Daang Matuwid” ad campaign is failing

Part 3.

 

 

this is a lethal combination for any campaign or brand – when your own ad campaign is doing badly while at the same time your competition’s ad campaigns are doing very well. you have nowhere to go for strength.

 

 

 

the Mar Roxas ad campaign fails in its advertising strategy. no amount of creative advertising or media spending can make an ad campaign work for you when the strategy is all wrong.

brand positioning is the most important and most powerful component of the advertising strategy. get the brand positioning wrong and everything else is wrong and weak.

the Mar Roxas campaign is so entrenched and totally defined by “Daang Matuwid” that any negative, any comment or any problem with it by extension is put on Mar Roxas. never mind that Roxas has no direct hand on them. voters are not seeing that. the take away of voters is that with Daang Matuwid as failing or having problems, Mar Roxas is failing and having problems.

elections are about the future, the things that will happen for us in the future. that is the reason why elections are about promises that the candidates are making now and will do in the future. Daang Matuwid is about the current and the past. a candidate promising the current and the past will not be going anywhere in an election that is about the future.

 

with Roxas placing 4th out of 5 presidentiables, his marketing and campaign objective is clear and obvious – he needs to convert supporters of his competitors into his camp. his goal is to look for switchers from his competitors, he needs to convert them to his camp.

“Daang Matuwid” does not do that. in fact the reason supporters of his competitors are supporting others is because they are promising something other than “Daang Matuwid”. promising “Daang Matuwid” is not giving them reason to switch. all that it will do is sustain his current power base which based on the surveys is a small minority.

 

 

 

dropping “Daang Matuwid” is a very major and serious change that the Mar Roxas campaign needs to do. it is necessary. keeping it in the campaign as a brand positioning will not move up Roxas’ standing in the surveys and not move him to win in the election.

there should be some consumer research that the Mar Roxas campaign can do to confirm my views on Daang Matuwid. regardless of the consumer research , the numbers that we have now supports my view – Roxas’ ratings are flat and he ranks 4th out of 5 candidates.

Mar Roxas’ “Daang Matuwid” ad campaign is a WAWAM!

 

 

 

 

 

 

Duterte-Cayetano TV Ad – powerful and meaningful messages

the omnibus Duterte-Cayetano TV ad positions them as the tandem for change. the set up is dirt is being thrown at the Duterte and Cayetano poster by those against change – “lumalabas na and mga galit at ayaw sa pagbabago” . scenes showing ordinary people putting up the Duterte-Cayetano posters and ad materials in their homes follow the intro with the copy talking about the changes that the tandem will give the country : “kapayapaan sa paligid”,” kaayusan sa ating gobyerno” at “kaginhawahan sa ating buhay”. the ad ends with their tagline – “Para Sa Tunay Na Pagbabago”.

it’s simple to understand and a powerful ad. “change” for the better is what most of us want and specially as it relates to peace and order, order in governance  and progress. the things that the Duterte and Cayetano tandem is promising are probably among the top things that people want to have or even to change in the current administration.

the tagline “Para Sa Tunay Na Pagbabago” may not be the best one for the ad but emphasizing “change” in it will make people notice. the ad does not really explain or make a point on where the “tunay” or real change is or what it means making  it disconnected with the rest of the ad.

the ad will appeal to 83%  of the voters. 83% is equivalent to all the respondents who did not select Roxas in the latest SWS survey.

this ad is a stark contrast to the whimsical and wild ads for Duterte which are in animation and full of over-promises pushing the ads into being incredible and unbelievable.

the ad will get the Duterte-Cayetano tandem noticed.

Mar Roxas campaign airs a mini attack ad

was talking about the need for an attack ad by the Roxas campaign. this one takes the form of an attack ad. https://t.co/0IrvWCpsnj

— WAWAM (@wawam) January 26, 2016

note : we are still looking for ways to post the video here. we will post it here once we are able to find a way to do it. 

just tonight, the Mar Roxas campaign aired what i can call a mini attack ad, a small version of the attack ad that i was tweeting about in the afternoon today.

we would have done a more aggressive and a definitively hard hitting attack ad than the one Roxas aired. and because it would be hard hitting, it would be best done by the Liberal Party and the LP senatoriables which is called an omnibus attack ad.

but it is an ad in the right direction. it is an ad better than what Roxas has aired previously and the times and situation that Roxas is in calls for such an ad.

 

senatoriable nancy binay’s TV ad – empty promises glorified

nancy binay, daughter of vice president jejomar binay will run for senator.  she released a tv ad, legally epal, with the tagline “Kay Nancy Binay – mga bata gaganda ang buhay” (With Nancy Binay – children will have a more beautiful life).

the ad positions the senatoriable as pro children with the  specific promises of improving education (“gaganda ang edukasyon”) and improving health (gaganda ang kalusugan”) leading to a more beautiful life (“gaganda ang buhay”) for the children.

it is an interesting positioning as it specifically places nancy on a pro-children promise. we do not remember political candidates having taken this positioning in the past. question is, is this enough to get her elected? is children’s good life a compelling proposition to voters? we assume some research has been done on this one.

while nancy’s advertising positioning and promise  is specific to pro-children, it is not specific on exactly what she plans to do in promoting the “good life” of children through “good education” and “good health”. it does not specifically answer the question – how will she do it?

in advertising, what is missing is called the “reason why” or the support. it tells the audience how will the candidate deliver the promise, what will she do to make it happen.

from an advertising technical standpoint it does have a “reason why” – it uses her dad, vice president binay with copy that says “mana sa kanyang ama” (“takes up [inherit] from her father”)  but does not say any specific action that nancy will take to improve education and health for children. all it does is to ride on the general popularity of her dad. after all, he did get elected vice president in the last presidential elections.

but jejomar is a weak reason why for the promise of children’s welfare – he is not known to be a children’s welfare advocate. in fact his ads during the vice presidential campaign were more on the general progress in the city of makati and the specific benefits residents of makati have gained while he was mayor there, children’s welfare was hardly mentioned.

the reason why, specially in political ads is very important. it gives specific promises as to what plan of action the candidate will do when elected into office. using a reason why that does not connect to the promise is of no help and of no consequence, it is like having none at all.

in this ad, nancy binay gave empty promises that we doubt will get her elected. it’s a WAWAM – what a waste of advertising money.

whatever happened to “the transformers” of richard gordon and bayani fernando?

we likes a lot the idea of “the transformers”  of gordon and bayani when they first announced their candidacy of president and vice-president. aside from that time, there was really no mention of it afterwards. too bad they didn’t they make a big  deal of it, we think  it could have been a game changer for them,

this poster artwork we have here we think is one of the best we have seen in this campaign.  

noynoy aquino asks – are you ready to vote?

why the loren legarda campaign collapsed – the drama queen factor

loren legarda’s ratings in the poll to begin with was bad,, mar roxas dominating the polls for vice-presidentiables from the very beginning, with mar enjoying double the ratings that legarda was getting.

recent movements in the polls for the vice-presidential race show dramatic changes – with jejomar binay resurgent, roxas softening while legarda collapsing badly. 

what? jejomar binay?  

that is the question most have been asking, binay has not done anything spectacularly different and attention calling in the recent weeks., how did binay manage to now be in the running in the election?

first, it’s the halo effect from a resurgent erap estrada. estrada and binays poll results rose at about the same time. estrada gaining in the polls had a positive effect on binay.

more than that, binay’s poll ratings went up as he gained supporters from the collapse of legarda in the polls. it appears a large part of those who abandoned legarda went to binay and much less to roxas. binay was the biggest beneficiary of the collapse of the legarda campaign.

we think advertising has a lot to do with it as well. from what we have seen, legarda have had a lot more tv ads aired over binay. but a look at the ads of legarda tells us these were ads that she should have not aired at all.

the ads of legarda depicted her as the essential drama queen  with her melodramatic, pa-drama effect delivery of her lines, the slow motion camera movements (or at least that is how it seems) and the ho-hum messages.  the legarda tv ads was just too personal and intimate  – the idea of  loren legarda taking care of everyone, the mother hen who will fix everything.

what makes these ads worst is the way she delivered her lines. she delivered all of them in a hushed, slow paced, tear jerky type of delivery that it makes the whole ad insincere, fake  and we are sure to many very funny. it was just too much on the emotions. or at least a trying hard effect on tugging at the hearts of voters.

we have written about legarda here before the election and we called her the drama queen for keeping us in so much in suspense if first will she run for president, then next as vice-president, then with what political party. in every interview during that time, she kept on the drama of suspending for all of us to watch the number of times she changed her mind and the length of time she needed to decide what to do with here political career.

we think in theses ads legarda simply  carried true what she really is – a drama queen.

• at last – loren legarda joins manny villar as VP. but let’s wait till 3:30 pm for the drama queen to say it
• drama queen senator loren legarda to announce 2010 plans within the week! oh, oh – here we go again!

1 vote, your vote can get noynoy a landslide win

noynoy aquino calls supporters to go out and vote!

corruption is the number 1 issue in the 2010 philippine election

help ensure a win – go out and vote for aquino and roxas

siguraduhing ipanalo sina aquino at roxas  – bumoto sa may 10.