In politics, you’re either on message or you are losing. Let’s get to it.
Welcome to On Message, a weekly look at where the battle lines are drawn and who is winning the war of words.
This week… MESSAGE TESTING.
As campaigns kick into high gear anyone who looks at a screen over the next eight weeks will be bombarded by campaign messages trying to persuade them to vote one way or the other.
The messages you hear – the way politicians and parties position themselves on the issues – is not something that happens by accident. A great deal of thought, refinement and testing goes into what is intended to become the narrative of a campaign.
Individual campaigns do it. Parties do it. And it all becomes the message they are trying to stay on and/or knock their opponents off.
Being on message means you have a strategy about what you say, to whom you say it, what channels you use to say it and even how often you say it.
But how do politicians hone in on their message? They do it through a process called message testing.
And it can happen a number of ways.
Sometimes they will float trial balloons in speeches or small meetings. Testing out a line in a less-scientific way to see how crowds respond to it. That’s low-cost and can be effective, if the group you test it with is representative of the larger group you are trying to influence.
Another way is to test lines with a focus group. These are selected more scientifically to serve as a representative sample so you get an idea, for example, of how white women 35-45 or hispanic men from 55-65 respond. These come with some cost but can give some important context.
Social media channels have allowed campaigns to test messages in a high-tech way by presenting two messages across a broader sample to see which one drives engagement. By using this A/B tests, campaigns can quickly see which messages catch the attention of any demographic. It’s kind of like a focus group on steroids.
This same approach is sued in fundraising emails to see which messages work to get donors to contribute.
For example: President Biden and the Democrats have clearly tested the term “MAGA Republicans” and are working to marginalize them. It seems clear they believe that specific term will fire up their base and potentially get more swing voters to agree with them.
Why do they do it? Because it’s effective. We all have biases and messages will hit our respective ears differently. If you can talk about your position on education, taxes or abortion in a way that resonates with your audience, you can get them to agree with you without offending them – all by taking the time to test the way you say it.
That’s it for this week.
More On Message in the next issue of the Utah Political Underground.
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