The mantra in bare-knuckle politics is to define your opponent before he can define himself. This branding touchstone has taken on a special significance in the simmering months of the 2012 presidential campaign. Of course, the opposite is crucial, too -- define yourself before your adversary cripples you with negative advertising. We spent this past winter and spring with our students exploring the nuances of candidate messaging. Our kids had a field day rating the various logos and slogans (here are
their verdicts, and some of
our posts).
Convention Logos
The newest logo juxtaposition centers on the Republican and Democratic National Conventions. These conventions can be decisive in delivering enduring speeches and rallying the faithful. In fact, then-Illinois State Senator Barack Obama became a national figure and heir-apparent in delivering the keynote address at
John Kerry’s 2004 nomination. His poignant words immediately registered among the annals of oratory. Now, in 2012, the parties have crafted logos to epitomize their conventions and messages.
The
Republican National Convention takes place August 27-30, in Tampa Bay, Florida. Released before the end of the primary process, the
GOP insignia admittedly was designed without a determined candidate. The Democrats, on the other hand, had the luxury of incumbency and predictability. In the
Republican icon, the trumpeting elephant is a potent, active depiction of the mascot. The colors are vivid and clear, and the patriotic impulse is telegraphed. Ultimately, however, the logo is a twitchy puzzle somewhere between a postage stamp and poster.
The heavy serif on the font, the cumbersome all-caps typeface, and the wide kerning between letters all yield a fuzzy, justified headline. The flag emblem is appropriate, but the downward slope leads the eye off the page, rather than looping back to a central focus. Worse still, the flag is obviously and instinctively wrong. It has too few stripes for the area depicted, and the unorthodox three stars in the blue field offer no clear significance. Finally, the convention planners seemed to feel that the host city deserved unusual prominence. “Tampa Bay” dominates the emblem, but the sideways contortion and the bold “Tampa” but thin “Bay” are disjointing to the eye. Florida is a crucial swing state, so the undue city prominence may be warranted, but the thick waves serve no purpose other than drawing focus and evoking strips of bacon. We would expect this seal rarely to see the light of day during prime time convention broadcasts.
The
Democratic National Convention picks up days later, from September 3-6, in Charlotte, North Carolina. The assembly's logo seeks to trigger an immediate visual connection with the
overall Obama brand, mimicking the Carolina-blue oval and the patriotic rising-sun colors. This kindred icon echoes everything about the Obama campaign’s buoyant messaging. The subtle alterations embrace the crowd-sourcing, grassroots designs of the Democratic strategy. The red horizon of celebratory citizens, gathered together in a joyous hand-clasp, all summon the energy of a lively convention. In particular, the insignia places the motivation and impetus on the people themselves as the profiled drivers of continued change. The downside is that it rests all the attention on the single candidate, rather than the political party or its platform. It also pays little homage to the host city, which could backfire in a crucial state that Obama narrowly won four years ago.
Branding The Other Candidate
President Obama’s campaign has worked hard to brand Governor Mitt Romney as a country club candidate. His team has hammered away at
Romney's pioneering outsourcing at Bain Capital and his millions of
dollars in shadowy off-shore accounts. The goal in this messaging is to
amp up the working-class base and to appeal to “undecideds” who fall
outside of exclusive beaches and dressage stables. The end result will
be a litmus test of negative/positive advertising and a call-to-arms for
America's changing census population.
The Romney camp, for its part, is striving to brand Obama as
"out of touch" and "anti-business." They’ve seized on stagnating
economic indicators as leverage for vague but forceful podium points
about failed stimuli and deadly regulations. Recently, the marketers
have clipped an Obama phrase that seemingly undercuts small business
owners. The “you didn’t build that” slogan quickly became the Romney
attack-du-jour, and the Democratic hand-wringing suggests that the barrage is working.
Campaign Designs
A recent article at
The Weeklings elucidates key take-aways about the subconscious communication of visual messaging. The feature, for example, freshly points out that John McCain’s 2008 campaign chose Optima, the
same font as the Vietnam Memorial. We’ve
extolled before the clarion of Obama’s 2008 Gotham design choice. It’s significant, therefore, that during this 2012 reelection gambit, Obama's team requested
an updated version of its iconic lettering from its favorite
Hoeffler & Frere-Jones shop. This time, his banner features a squared serif, in equal weighting between President and Vice-President. The
Weeklings article also points out that Romney’s squad, not accidentally, plucked Mercury and Whitney typefaces created by the exact same
Hoeffler & Frere-Jones design firm. If you are unfamiliar with their work, here is a terrific
PBS Off Book video highlighting the insights of H&F-J.
Even the labeling of routine bus tours seems to matter. The
Caucus blog at
The New York Times offered a
recreational retrospective of past candidate bus trips through the American heartland. The best moniker continues to be McCain’s “
Straight Talk Express.” The worst wordsmithing falls to 2008 GOP candidate Fred Thompson’s tour, dubbed “
The Clear Conservative Choice: Hands Down!”
The campaign gift shops also deserve artistic focus as reinforcers of brands. The Obama team organized a "
Runway To Win" t-shirt design contest on its official web site. The three winners now can see their creations
for sale online. This popular appeal and non-hierarchical marketing parallels the overall strategy of the Democratic outreach. The
Romney site also offers t-shirts with twists on the standard insignia. The governor's team has fashioned a special line of "
vintage" shirts in an attempt to bridge the older Republican demographic with the retro-loving younger voters.
For additional reading, we recommend:
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