May 02, 2007
A Study In Brands: Who's The Best Democrat?
Who has the best brand in presidential politics? We're kind of obsessed with that concept because it nicely encapsulates the idea that primary voters chose a package of attributes -- a brand -- rather than a package of issue positions.
Two ad agencies in South Carolina, Chernoff Newman and MarketSearch, assessed the brands associated with the Democratic presidential candidates and used consumer surveys to score the brands in a variety of categories.
Awareness -- you've got to know the brand -- awards a high score to Hillary Clinton. A full 100% of respondents know her. But more than 95% know John Edwards, Al Gore and Barack Obama. All their brands are saturated. (Dennis Kucinich has a brand awareness rating of less than 65%).
Then comes Reputation. It's a basic fav/un-fav scale. Which brands do folks like? Clinton and Edwards score over 80; Gore and Obama have ratings over 65.
But
When we examine reputation more closely by looking at net scores, the viable field of candidates narrows considerably, with Clinton, Edwards and Obama emerging as the top tier candidates. Clinton and Edwards have net positive scores of 70, followed by Obama at 65 percent. Gore falls to 41 percent, with every other candidate trailing far behind.
In other words, Gore may have some hidden unfavorables that emerge only when prompted.
Then comes personality, which Chernoff Newman defines as "trustworthy, interesting, likable, warm and charming and looks presidential." [On Call note: we'd quibble with the lumping together of these categories.] Obama scores the highest here, followed by John Edwards, followed by Hillary Clinton, followed by Al Gore. Gore and Clinton have lower scores in this category.
What Clinton "lacks" in personality, she makes up for in competence.
When it comes to having the most respect from other countries, preparation to be president, relevant experience, intelligence and having the best plan for the war in Iraq, Clinton outscores her opponents by nearly 4-1.
Finally, connectivity. How closely does the brand identify with you and your concerns? John Edwards tops the charts.
We're sure Mark Blumenthal will weigh in. One concern we have is that these categories aren't necessarily valid measures of the attributes they purport to describe, and may in fact conflate several variables.
What's promising about the project, though, is that Chernoff Newman/MarketSearch will conduct this survey throughout the campaign. Changes in these measurements might mean changes in how voters are responding to different presidential brands. [MARC AMBINDER]
Posted at 10:27 AM
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