Democrats fretting over their party’s messaging may be worried about the wrong part of their side’s strategy for the presidential cycle. At least that’s according to a top Republican media buyer.
“This year really proved that the buying and delivery of a message is almost as important as the message that’s being delivered,” Adam Wise, an SVP at National Media Research, Planning & Placement, told C&E.
“That’s my single biggest takeaway from [2024].”
Moreover, Wise pointed to the use of so-called “zero-party data,” which is marketing data that voters voluntarily give to brands or other advertisers, as a differentiator.
“Zero-party in the sense of understanding where and how to mix things together, how to profile and understand ROI on different media investments – it has never been more key,” he said.
For instance, he noted that in Pennsylvania, zero-party data was key to reaching men ages 25-54 without a college education.
“Those are frankly, the lowest consumers in media all together,” he said, noting that premium placements like live sports were a way to reach this group.
“But you can’t generate frequency that way,” he added. “We had to find other ways to generate frequency, like YouTube and streaming audio. And you had to think a little bit differently because those aren’t people that are at home watching Jeopardy! or Wheel of Fortune. So you have to do different buying tactics than we’ve done historically. That’s a really big change.”
Wise contrasted his side’s approach with Democratic buyers going heavy on social media and neglecting traditional broadcast TV.
“I think something that is important to highlight is that TV still works … it still moves the needle massively,” he said. “And looking at the presidential environment, you had the Harris campaign yield a lot of ground on broadcast TV.”
In October, Trump and Harris were at near parity on broadcast despite her having a significant advantage in August.
“For how big her fundraising machine was, to not have a heavier advantage on good old fashioned linear TV is still a little bit of an earth shattering revelation for me as I look back at the cycle,” he said.
