What Politicians Do Better Than Business: Marketing

Whatever one might say about the effectiveness of political governance in the US today, marketers have a lot to learn about the way politicians do marketing. You don't see politicians jumping on the latest bright shiny objects in marketing such as AI. They are succeeding by doing it the old-fashioned way: identifying and building relationships with the people most likely to vote.

By Bruce Bolger

Politicians Can't Afford the Inefficiencies of Today's Marketing
7 Things Successful Politicians Consistently Do That Marketers Do Not

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While many marketers continue to focus on better ways to “spray and pray” and the latest fads such as AI, politicians play a fully integrated holistic ground game that combines every medium focused on their purpose, goals, objectives, and values, in a way that engages by telling a story.

Why does the former president and current candidate Donald Trump continue to do so well despite controversies that would disqualify almost anyone else? Great marketing. He has identified and built relationships with the people most likely to vote and donate and won their loyalty and engagement with a story they believe. I have rarely witnessed Trump voters even receptive to changing their minds.

Most major marketers continue to waste enormous sums on vanity signage, exhibits, and advertising; focus on process instead of results so there is no measure of business impact, and do little to build meaningful relationships. Even many local politicians are far more effective than leading brands at identifying and building relationships with the people most likely to buy through a multi-touchpoint approach. They can’t afford to waste money the way many organizations do.

Great brands, like politicians, create a persona people identify with or aspire to. Where most brands fail is in bringing that story home to each customer or prospect in a meaningful way that builds ongoing loyalty and relationships.

The proof is in their results. According to the Congressional Research Service, the average tenure for a House representative at the beginning of the latest Congress was 8.5 years (4.3 House terms); for Senators, 11.2 years (1.9 Senate terms). That’s a pretty good average of repeat business in an otherwise divided country. For a great example, one look no further than the Republican candidate for president.

Politicians Can't Afford the Inefficiencies of Today's Marketing

CEOs are right to be skeptical about marketing. Ironically, CEOs don’t appear to have much confidence in their own marketing efforts. According to a survey conducted last year by McKinsey (that did not disclose the number of marketing executives surveyed) and conversations with 100 CEOs in conjunction with the Association of National Advertisers, “Sometimes CEOs feel they are missing the link between marketing measurement and business impact. On average, the CEOs responding to our survey feel that marketing metrics clearly tie to business impact less than 60% of the time. CEOs cannot properly manage their growth strategy without understanding a direct link between marketing measurement and business impact.” The report finds that relatively few chief marketing officers sit at the executive committee.

In the end, sustainable success for both marketers and politicians depend on continually satisfying the customer and communicating success. Even the most successful marketing fails if the candidate, product, or service cannot deliver.

Why are politicians better marketers than marketers? They have to be. They either win or lose; there are no increments, and everything is measurable. While many politicians are great salespeople, that’s not generally their background or approach. They see themselves more as communicators and advocates than salespeople.

7 Things Successful Politicians Consistently Do That Marketers Do Not

1. Politicians have a fully holistic approach. Enduring politicians combine purpose, goals, and objectives with values and a story, which good marketers also accomplish. But politicians take it one step further down to the one-to-one level with a combination of fully integrated face-to-face, digital, print, social, media focused on helping people. Brand marketers are good up to the story part, but that’s where their process begins to break down into a series of often siloed advertising, public relations, direct and digital marketing strategies that amount to throwing spaghetti at a wall. No wonder CEOs are skeptical.

2. Politicians focus on identifying the people most likely to vote. Of course, brand marketers have a clear sense of the demographics, personas, and location of prospects. The best politicians take it all the way down to the household because undoubtedly someone has knocked on a door or had a phone, email, or social interaction. One-to-one marketing is built into their business models because every vote counts.

3. They personalize and authenticate their brands on a one-to-one basis. Whether it’s a knock at the door, a piece of mail, an email, social media ad, community forum or other event, there is a personal interaction that rarely occurs with such consistensy in free enterprise.

4. They know how to recognize customers. Politicians often swoon over donors with an array of benefits, including public recognition, access, photo opportunities, and other value adds. Years of loyalty to name-brand companies has not earned almost any interaction coming close to what donors at that level get in many cases. Companies are often pretty good at recognizing their distribution partners, but in so doing outsource critical customer relationships upon which few channel partners capitalize.

5. They inform. They hold local forums, town hall meetings, publish e-newsletters, social media, with local news and information. The content may be no less biased than consumer or business-to-business model but at least they try to create value by demonstrating accomplishments and providing updates about local construction or other government initiatives.

6. They focus on relationships, not transactions. Great politicians have a one-on-one relationship with their constituents, even as voters. They make people feel heard and reflect their voice by promptly responding to issues on a one-to-one basis. Most would agree that few brands set high standards for customer service except in rare cares for high-volume customers. Great local politicians have active constituent help desks and then make news when they solve a problem. How often do we hear of a brand touting its success at solving a customer problem? The focus is usually on some award they have received from a paid-for service.

7. They demonstrate value creation. When successful politicians bring home the bacon, they make it known. Business marketers are good at making promises—how often do they clearly demonstrate the value they create other than through third-party quality or service designations that fewer and fewer people believe?

After 30 years of talking about building relationships with customers, there’s little sign of implementation in business. Ask yourself: how many times has any company just ramdomly contacted you out of the blue with a personal call to thank you for your business? Create a checklist of your own interaction with a company or brand and you will find it rarely occurs anywhere but but before or after the point of sale with almost no authentic attempt to build a relationship.

Here's a simple playbook any organization can use to implement what politicians do day in and day out.

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