Presidential Mobile Campaign
According t o Newsweek magazine Barack Obama is the most powerful man in the world. Soon to be the president of the United States of America Barack Obama has created a history for being the first African American President. The charismatic president elect launched a fully integrated marketing campaign for his 2008 Presidential Election but the highlight of the election campaign was the innovative use of mobile channel.
The Barack Obama election campaign used all facets of mobile campaign. The primary target audience for the mobile campaign was young voters that are digitally savvy and politically inclined. The young voters were encouraged to visit Obama’s website and register for text message program to stay on top of the latest news. The campaign included downloadable ring tones, wall papers, text message alerts on Barack Obama’s local events, other big news, coupons to buy items at candidate’s online store etc. The mobile channel was optimized to reach voters in a continuous but non-intrusive way and the frequency was kept to 1-2 messages per week.
A special iPhone application was also launched to engage iPhone user. The application allowed users to read campaign news, press releases, photos and video highlights. Other impressive features of the application were “Get Involved” that was based on GPS location technology to get information on closest Obama campaign office, “Call Friends”, “Local Events” and “Donate” link at the bottom of the page.
Clearly the objective of the mobile channel in the campaign was to drive voters to vote besides getting donations. The campaign achieved its aforesaid target very effectively; thousands of people went for advance voting. The campaign also helped Obama team to build an extraordinary database of the young voters with pivotal information like mobile numbers, email addresses, zip codes etc.
Texting is truly has a phenomena and the success of Obama campaign has unveiled the true potential of mobile channel then
WHAT ARE MARKETERS AND CORPORATES WAITING FOR??
Please send in your comments and share your favorite mobile marketing success story.
Kriti Jaising
its an excellent article. surely 2008 presidential election was very unique and path breaking just like its winner President Elect Barck Obama. The campaign marketing team used a mix of innovatiove channels to attract the youth. youth that prefers Obama over republican candidate John McCain.
i’ll be looking forward for some interesting case studies in your future blog
good article. i liked the campaign and i did visit the Barack Obama website. it is good. i am interested in using mobile channel for my company but still not clear on the how much to spend and how to calculate the returns. Is mobile marketing also cost effective like email and where can i get the mobile numbers of the people i want to send my marketing message. if someone can answer these question, i’ll be more than happy to include mobile marketing in my marketing plan.
great write up. Thank you for providing the link to the actual campaign. It helped me really understand the value of mobile marketing.
–Jack
Thanks. Obama presidential campaign should get the award for the best marketing campaign, very well integrated and each media vehicle used is based on its strength. Hats off Mr. President and its campaign management team