Ad Makers Have Gleaned From Their Focus Groups, What Moves Moderates to Want to Dump Trump
July 3rd 2020
Donald Trump speaking with supporters at a Make America Great Again campaign rally at International Air Response Hangar at Phoenix-Mesa Gateway Airport in Mesa, Arizona (Gage Skidmore)
By jamess (of the Daily Kos community)
I stumbled upon this article today, and thought I’d share it with the readers here. The entire article is very good. It has some keen insights into moderates and independents, who “took a chance” and voted for Trump, last time around. Many of whom, who are now in the “persuadable” category these days.
Cited below are some the key take-aways from extensive focus group studies. But the entire article is an interesting read.
Democratic ad makers think they’ve discovered Trump’s soft spot
After more than a year of polling, focus groups and message testing against the president, there’s a growing consensus about what damages Trump — and what doesn’t.
by David Siders, Politico — 07/02/2020
[...]
Multiple outside groups said they began to test their ads more rigorously than in 2016, using online panels to determine how likely an ad was to either change a viewer’s impression of Trump or to change how he or she planned to vote. Priorities USA, a major Democratic super PAC, alone expects to test more than 500 ads this cycle. Priorities, American Bridge and other outside groups, including organized labor, have been meeting regularly to share internal research and media plans.
“One thing we saw in polling a lot before the coronavirus outbreak is that people didn’t think he was a strong leader or a good leader, they complained about his Twitter,” said Nick Ahamed, analytics director at Priorities USA. “But they had a hard time connecting those character flaws they saw in him with their day-to-day experience.”
Trump’s response to the coronavirus pandemic and recent protests, he said, “really made concrete for people the ways in which his leadership has direct consequences on them and their loved ones … It’s easier to make ads that talk about his leadership than before the outbreak.”
[...]
But the ad makers’ overarching takeaway from their research was this: While Trump may not be vulnerable on issues of character alone, as he demonstrated in 2016, he is vulnerable when character is tied to his policy record on the economy and health care.
Out of all the crazy things that came out of the Tulsa-palooza rally, the message that actually worked to move Voters AWAY from Trump, were Ads/Clips like these:
It seems when Trump’s incompetence impacts people at a personal level, that suddenly they sit up and take notice. That would be people who don’t “follow politics” in any serious way.
It’s their pocketbook they care about. Same as it ever was.
And now it’s now their health, and that of their families, that has those middle-of-road Voters, ready to Dump Trump, for the incompetent fool that he is.
Trump is playing with people’s actual lives — and livelihoods — and that’s got a significant number of them to sit up and take notice. And NOT in a good way, for the ‘Celebrity Apprentice’ president.
Posted with permission