Politics is about connection, empathy, and advocacy. At VDX.tv, our ad units seek to push the envelope in terms of how we engage with our audiences and create meaningful experiences. An ad, whether on your television, laptop, or mobile device, need not be a passive intrusion into your life. Instead, it can be an engaging experience that either starts or continues a conversation around a candidate or issue. Being able to do this is why I jumped at the opportunity to join the team at VDX.tv and help bring this technology to bear in as many races this cycle, and beyond.
The ability to find, match, and target relevant audiences with ads has never been more precise, and continues to improve, paralleling advancements in technology.
Great strides have also been made in analytics and our ability to measure the impact ads are having. In politics, due to constraints of time and budget, measuring the impact and efficacy of ads is too often seen as an unnecessary luxury. So other proxies for performance are used, such as click through rate and video completion rate.
While the ability to target audiences and measure the impact of the targeting is crucial to the success of a campaign, perhaps even more important is how the audience is targeted and with what content. As we push forward with more advanced targeting methods in political advertising, we must ensure we are being equally as creative with how we communicate our message and connect with our target audience.
A simple display ad can only do so much - the same goes for a standard pre-roll video. However, by creating high-impact, video-driven placements that foster engagement VDX.tv is better able to deliver ads that are not passive experiences but interactive ones.
For a political campaign to be successful a strong field game is a necessity. However, on-the-ground work is limited by several factors, the primary being a lack of manpower. But in terms of creating engagement, there is no substitute for it. To fill the gaps in reach and scale and to amplify and augment that work, a digital presence is essential. That digital presence should also try to continue the conversation and mirror the engagement of the field work.
We can reach more people now more precisely than ever before, thanks to advances in industry tech. And that’s a great accomplishment. But let’s make sure how we are reaching them is just as innovative and impactful. With each election cycle seemingly getting tighter and more significant, we don’t have the luxury of being unimaginative.
Interested in learning how VDX.tv can help boost audience engagement for your political ad campaign? Contact politics@vdx.tv
