Political Consumers Do More Than Observe (On Consumers)

Quadrennial: a high-falutin’ way to describe an event that happens every four years.

The quadrennial exercise in 2012, of course, is the election of the next president of the United States. While the election itself, the actual voting, occurs every four years, it seems these days that campaigns – presidential or otherwise – are never-ending. Advertising, public relations, social networking and email marketing initiatives are engaged in targeting and persuading consumers.

Consumers? Yes, political consumers. Not only do these individuals follow candidates and issue politics from one election to another; they routinely make consumer choices of products and services based on political or ethical considerations. It’s what the University of Washington’s Center for Communication & Civic Engagement calls “all forms of public activity giving people a voice in building community, advocating policy, and advancing democratic values.”

As core consumers, those whom we dub as political are influenced just as any shopper would be when making a purchasing decision. Those who market to political consumers, then, make no distinction in the use of a wide range of media to reach their audience.

Pay a bit more attention to traditional television advertising. Seen any commercials lately on the benefits of natural gas? Clean coal? On the good deeds of an oil company promoting tourism in Gulf Coast states? How about a series of well-produced and expertly placed 60-second spots on the prideful expertise of one of America’s largest corporations? We’ll not tell you the full name, only the initials: GE. From promoting energy-saving light bulbs to fostering confidence in giant jet engines, corporations spend millions burnishing their brands.

They will even insert themselves into the broad health care debate by aligning the company with greater consumer access to medical treatment through inclusive technology – all in an attempt to influence the political consumer who has a direct impact on retail purchasing and individual and institutional investing.

Forget all the candidate claptrap. It’s political consumerism that demands more individual and corporate responsibility. Politicians and corporations have come to realize that consumers can be political animals who process their choices at the ballot box and in store aisles based on lifestyles. Focus group research indicates that consumers are indeed being swayed by political communications, which use lifestyle references couched in terms of self-image and consumer choice. Our University of Washington colleagues call it “attaching political messages to consumer brands.”

Consumers are campaigners too as they impact the politics of public interest and exert pressure on officeholder and corporate boardroom behavior. To be sure, consumer-oriented campaigns are designed to raise the awareness of consumers, while corporate campaigns attempt to mold opinion.

Political consumers will have choices, as the true political season of 2012 features a vast number of contests in Arkansas. Not only will we be participating in the national quadrennial exercise; we will have a decennial one of our own. Of course, each of the 100 seats of the Arkansas House of Representatives will come under voter scrutiny as they do every two years. But note that every 10 years all 35 state Senate seats are in play, due to redrawn legislative districts based on the latest census – this year, the 2010 census. Plus, non-candidate ballot issues on which Arkansans will vote at the November general election have either been referred by the Legislature or are being initiated by voters themselves through petition drives.

Voters will vote based on awareness of how they align themselves with political brands, whether candidates or issues. And consumers will make purchasing decisions according to their relationship with products and services.

What is evolving, however, is the notion that cause marketing will influence decision-making through new networks of consumer and corporate activism: social networks, political organizations, corporate-created communities, single-issue affiliations and the like. The landscape will be uneven. Perspectives will remain fluid and ever changing. The issues will be of the moment, perhaps of the hour. Consumers will consider their options, and elections will come and go.

Craig Douglass is an advertising agency owner and partner with Zoe and Ernie Oakleaf in InFocus LLC, a focus group research company in Little Rock.