Super Conversations Matter More than Super PACs in Presidential Election - Ed Keller

quotBig outside political groups with an unprecedented river of money had appeared poised to be pivotal players in the 2012 elections So far these super PACs are looking less than superquot That is the lead of a surprising story quotSuper PAC Influence Falls Short of Aimsquot that appeared recently in The Wall Street JournalCould this be true Research by Keller Fay for the National Journal being conducted during this political season suggests yes Our Conversation Nation research conducted continuously and published weekly looks at the word of mouth dynamics of the presidential race As the race heats up media and marketing plays a big role in people39s conversations about the candidates But it is the earned media amp8211news coverage that has people talking ads themselves play a far more modest roleThreequarters of people39s word of mouth conversations about both President Obama and Governor Romney include something people see on TV or on the internet or in print media with TV playing the biggest role This is far higher than the 50 we normally see for conversations about consumer products and services TV plays the biggest role but it is TV programsnews that provide the biggest spark when it comes to what people talk about with TV ads coming in far behind People are three times more likely to talk about what they see on TV news than the ads they see 33 vs 11 In the battleground states where so much of the ad blitz is focused the difference is narrower but even there TV news sparks more conversations than the ads by a margin of 31 to 14Over the course of the past month we see that word of mouth about Obama is more positive 43 than negative 37 for Romney it tilts much more negative 43 than positive 31 When we look at topics of conversation for each candidate by polarity the impact of ads does not make any difference TV ads are talked about in almost identical numbers when the conversations about Obama and Romney are positive 13 and 12 of the time respectively and when they are negative 11 and 12 respectively In each case the WOM being sparked by the earned media of television news is about three times as greatWhile both candidates have spent a lot of time and effort fundraising at the end of the day political operatives understand that the key to success in a presidential election is the persuasion that comes from personal contacts either from the campaign or from people talking to other people they know personally Nate Silver of FiveThirtyEight has reported that an analysis he conducted just after the 2008 election found that quotin 2008 about a fourth of all voters were contacted in some way by the Obama campaign Mr McCain39s campaign contacted 18 percent of generalelection votersquot and that quoteach marginal 10point advantage in contact rate translated into a marginal 3point gain in the popular vote in that statequot Many of these contacts happened when local volunteers call or go speak personally with their neighborsWhile there was a lot of focus on the impact that money would play in this campaign when the election season started the results to date are centered far more around the performance of the candidates themselves That is the narrative that is driving the news coverage and entering into the day to day conversations of votersThus far it39s not the Super PACs that are driving the outcome It39s the facetoface conversations that have been super charged by earned media coverageEd Keller CEO of the Keller Fay Group has been called quotone of the most recognized names in word of mouthquot His new book The FacetoFace Book Why Real Relationships Rule in a Digital Marketplace was recently published by Free PressSimon ampamp Schuster You can follow Ed Keller on Twitter Facebook and Google or contact him directly at ekellerkellerfaycomRead all Edamp8217s MediaBizBloggers commentaries at WOM MattersCheck us out on Facebook at MediaBizBloggerscomFollow our Twitter updates MediaBizBloggerThe opinions and points of view expressed in this commentary are exclusively the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaBizBloggerscom management or associated bloggers MediaBizBloggers is an open thought leadership platform and readers may share their comments and opinions in response to all commentaries

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Super Conversations Matter More than Super PACs in Presidential Election - Ed Keller

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