Election Fever Has Bumped All The Regular Ads Off The Hemisphere Here in Northeast Ohio.
Northeast Ohio, also known right now as the election swing location in the nation, is so full of PR, news and ads about tomorrow’s election, that I’ve holding back some of my client’s press releases until after the election results are in.
And I know business who need to advertise in the fall… but with all the election publicity prices are too high right now and the competition is extremely fierce for good slots.
Tracy Smuts, owner of Capstone Media — a Northeast Ohio media buying company – estimated that a reported $177 million (as of Monday 10/29) has been spent in Ohio this fall already. She was interviewed by CNN this past week about how it is affecting her clients advertising programs. By Friday, I heard the figure was $180 million (the full segment lists this figure, not the online version.)
Jean Giagnafanga of Giganfanga Marketing in Westlake, also received national publicity about how the election has affected her during the last few weeks.
Another one of other friends posted on Facebook that she has decided to unplug her landline phone until after the election.
On Saturday our mailbox had 11 different political postcards. In one day! While getting your name out there is important to win an election, I believe that the fever pitch of the spending has caused many in Northeast Ohio to turn a deaf ear to all the telemarketing and commercials and a blind eye to all the direct mail and lawn signs. Watching the storm news from Hurricane Sandy was almost a welcome break from the election news, but guess what? Even with the hurricane we had 7 phone calls in 12 hours trying to force feed the candidate’s views.
I’ve heard it compared to a firehose and that’s how it feels. And for the companies that do try to get their message out there, many folks will not be listening because of the intensity of all the political advertising.
I’m hoping that people will resume watching ads, answering their phone and paying attention to marketing in general after all the hype is over and the election is decided.
