Our National Community
Last night’s fireside chat Larry Grisolano provide me with amazing insight – both into the political campaigns process and marketing to the American public. Those revelations stayed with me throughout the night, and I wanted to share a few of them in anticipation of Larry’s larger speech today at Mplanet.
1. Marketers must clearly identify, through research and conversation, what challenges their brand. In early stages, based on research, Obama’s commitment to change politics in America was not as challenged by the other leading candidates as it was by the attitude of “cynicism” among the electorate. Seems to me, if they hadn’t figured that out, perhaps the election would have had a different outcome.
2. Brands cannot be all things to all people; marketers should leverage a clear message and brand identity. Later in the primary, there was a lot of attention paid to the difference in being a change agent v. necessity for experience to lead the country. The team learned it was difficult to be both (according to research) so it diluted Senator Clinton’s message that attempted to combine her resume with her desire to change Washington.
3. American consumers today want genuine engagement and credible message that allows them to own part of the brand experience. Obama campaign activated “a sense of national community,” similar to feeling after 9/11.
Creating a sense of national community is no small undertaking. I hope you’re able to join us today for more insights from Larry. If not, stay tuned for my later post on his presentation.
Nancy Costopulos, the American Marketing Association’s chief marketing officer, provided the above post.
Posted by Mplanet on January 28, 2009 9:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)
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