PR, Advertising, or Both?

A few years ago, I had the opportunity to work as a communications director for a political campaign. If you’ve ever worked on a political campaign, it will be apparent right away that your campaign co-workers believe that “communications director” is the glamour job. It’s certainly more glamorous than fundraising, organizing neighborhood canvassing teams, or combing through thousands registration forms to find out where the campaign should be canvassing.

In fact, the people who have these other jobs are so taken with the communications post that it will not be surprising to find they too are marketing experts. Communications directors stand to get the blame for low turnout at press conferences, poor fundraising (“If only we had better press.”), and a bad candidate. The kicker? There’s very little glamour in it.

Hidden Persuader

Communications is a “block and tackling” job. You must get reporters to attend press conferences; you must keep bad stories out of the papers. You are a persuader in the process and must work to get as much coverage as possible, even in venues where your candidate is lacking, i.e., off the cuff remarks, debates, press exchanges.

In communications, or PR, you are in the position of trying to persuade another person–the press–to do something that benefits the client. In advertising, you are trying to come up with words and images that persuade the ultimate consumer.

In PR, you work for the cherished “third party endorsement” by the press, political allies, so-called independent analysts, or “do gooder” organizations, such as the Sierra Club. The advantage is that someone else besides the campaign is praising the candidate. The campaign needs to control what endorsers are saying as much as possible.

Pay to Play

In advertising, the campaign has more or less total control of the message, but you’re paying for it. Unfortunately, advertising can be just as messy as PR. Our campaign had an ad calling out the incumbent for slow reaction to wildfires that plagued our city. We ran a radio ad that featured fire engine sirens and a little girl saying, “Daddy, why did our house burn down?” Subtle?  No. But then, political advertising rarely is. Nevertheless, we were forced to defend the ad–not a good thing–on the grounds that the sirens scared people and that the little girl asking why her house burned down was “over the top.”

Always take enough time–even in the midst of a hot and heavy campaign–to think about whether your message is better carried by advertising or public relations–or both, and evaluate the possible downside of each course of action.