Marketing Candidates: Playing the Race/Gender/Maverick Card

Throughout this presidential campaign, people have offered criticism of the major candidates based on stereotypes.  Barak Obama has been accused of “playing the race card" (pardon the overworked cliché). Hillary Clinton was called the iron maiden and seen as too cold and calculating.  John McCain’s campaign almost miscarried because he was seen as George Bush’s third term. 

            It’s all true.  Obama did base some of his campaign on race, and Clinton did try to appeal to women by showing her feminine side (hold the hate mail, I’m making a point about marketing).  McCain tried to separate himself from Bush and recover his old image.  The key is marketing.  In all cases, these candidates engaged in smart marketing strategy and they did it in a way that their opponents could never have done.

            In South Carolina and Mississippi, Obama appealed directly to African  Americans. He spoke directly to the issues blacks think are important and employed accent and jargon with which they might identify.  Was it effective?  Look at the results?  It was effective primarily because Obama is black.  If any of his white opponents had tried the same strategy, the result would have been a campaign melt down. 

            In order to appeal to women, Clinton needed to soften her image.  We were allowed to witness an interview in which Hillary appeared with a slight sniffle in her voice and a little tear in her eye.  The result was an almost immediate campaign turn around.  Can you imagine what might have occurred if either Obama or McCain had appeared in an interview with a sniffle and a tear.  If that had happened to either of them, I assure you that individual would not be a viable presidential candidate today.  Sincerely or not, Clinton engaged in a smart marketing strategy that neither of her opponents could match.   

            Last fall McCain’s campaign was approaching moribund status, he pulled it out of the nose dive, by appealing to his long-established maverick image.  He spoke about how he had taken on Rumsfeld, by criticizing his management of the Iraq war.  Then he pointed out how he fought “K” street lobbyists and got some war profiteers jailed.  Again, his opponents could not have matched this strategy and it saved his campaign. 

            We may decry the fact that campaigns are run with marketing principles not unlike the way commercial products are sold, but the fact is they are.  We cannot blame candidates from engaging in the game using the rules that exist.  If they did not do so they would soon be ex-candidates.  If we want the system to change, we must change it.  Candidates will not do so.  Indeed, they could not do so, even if they wanted.   

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