Iglesia NI Cristo endorses noynoy aquino and mar roxas – is it worth anything?

this is philippine politics tradition – waiting  for the Iglesia Ni Cristo’s endorsement of who they will be asking their flock to vote in the coming election, for this one, noynoy aquino and mar roxas got INC’s endorsement.

the timing is also perfect – just a few days before election day. this is an excellent boost to name recall and will re-energize the aquino and roxas supporters and campaigners. it’s excellent timing to get an army of supporters going for the kill with just a few days to go.

is there any value to this endorsement?

iglesia has a reported command vote of 3 million to 5 million. we think that is an exaggeration. we also think command votes from religious groups do not really materialize. 

the real value of this endorsement is bragging rights and excellent media mileage, not actual huge numbers of votes. this kind of news is excellent news for the media to write about and for the people to talk about. it is also an excellent topic for the aquino campaign to banner.

we will most likely be reading about this in the next day or two and will get a lot of media interviews for aquino and roxas. this is best used for press interviews but might not be a good idea to talk about it extensively during public meetings as it has the potential to turn off none iglesia members.

certainly this has the potential to tip the scale in favor of aquino from a bragging rights point of view with pastor quiloboy endorsing gilbert teodoro the other day. iglesia is a much larger religious group than the pastor’s.

the key question now will be how will the other campaigns handle the situation? this leaves manny villar in the cold and puts teodoro back down to earth with his lowly 7% rating in the polls.

there is a clear momentum for the aquino campaign now.

noynoy aquino – the teflon presidentiable, nothing sticks!

the 2010 election is probably one of the nastiest philippine presidential election in its history. not that philippine elections are known for intelligent debates on national issues, but noynoy aquino in particular have received the worst kinds of negative attacks.

there is a very long laundry list of negative and even personal attacks on noynoy aquino that started almost on the day after he announced his candidacy. almost all the attacks were personal – lack of achievements,  lack of experience, being a bachelor, being autistic,  his cigarette smoking, his hair or lack of it, his use of his parents credentials and  the most recent, the double fake psyche reports.

but none of it, not a single negative attack  got to stick to aquino. that makes aquino a teflon presidentiable.

aquino’s standing in the polls since the very start has not changed  – he has been the front runner. while his current rating may not be as high as what it was at the start, he continue to dominate the other presidentiables.  shrinkage from his going in rating is normal and expected. what is unusual and admirable is that he has maintained his front runner status from day one till now even though black propaganda against aquino was always there in various and new forms.

how was aquino able to survive such atttacks?

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this is next at The 2010 Presidentiables Blog….

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.

june 2009 – for presidentiables, be there or die!

we have posted it here before – it is our belief that the absolute deadline for presidentiables to launch their campaign for the presidency is on june, 2009. any candidate serious about running for the presidential elections in 2010 need to be on the radar screens of voters by that month. getting in later than that will make it more difficult to become a factor during the elections.

messages, including candidates need time to build up over time. cutting it too close to the election period will mean more funds to make a difference and a stance that involves turning the tide against the candidate or turning it in his/her favor. that usually is much more difficult and contains too many risks versus doing a slow burn and build up.

we see the presidentiables coming out now. for those who aren’t out yet, june is the last month to do so.

the grave harm “winnability” does to philippine elections

this is next in 2010 presidentiables.

memo to presidentiables: next steps from 4Qtr SWS presidentiables survey results

just a quick run through of key action steps for the presidentiables coming from the 4qtr 2008 results of the SWS survey for presidentiables. we have intentionally over-simplified the points.

for the top 3, de castro, legarda and villar: 

•  keep doing what you are doing
• DO NOT make any mistake, watch your steps all the time

for the next 4, escudero, lacson, estrada and roxas:

• need to get more media exposure
• be selective on issues to pick on, but consistently pick one across time

for the next 2, binay and fernando:

• think and behave like you only have 1 week of your life in this world
• there is no time to waste, get into the minds of the public across all geographies and demographics

how to win the 2010 philippine elections : philippine marketing and philippine advertising 101

this blog will look at the philippine election from a marketing and advertising perspective. winning an election is really no different from doing marketing and advertising for mass consumer products like detergent products, toothpaste and computer products. the same principles, the same strategies and tactics, consumer research and marketing mix are applied. candidates who do the best marketing and advertising will win the election.

this blog is a spin off from WAWAM! (http://the-wawam-file.blogspot.com/) where a large amount of posts have been posted on philippine political ads and the recent 2008 US presidential campaign. 

note: “presidentiables” are candidates who are running for the office of the president or a presidential candidate. it was probably coined by a desk editor of a newspaper to have a single word for it to take less space in newspaper headlines.