• by Shankar Gupta , May 17, 2005

Political candidates are starting to believe that online advertising allows them far greater opportunities to extend reach and target constituents than do traditional ad campaigns, said panelists Monday at a conference in New York City sponsored by Personal Democracy Forum, a Web site dedicated to examining how technology and the Internet are changing American politics.

What's more, politicos will continue to spend more online in the next election, predicted the panelists. Michael Bassik, a Democratic political consultant with Malchow Schlackman Hoppey & Cooper Partners, forecast that 2006 will a big year for online advertising in the political sector. "I think '06 is going to be insane," he said. "The amount of work we've done--it's more attention than I've ever seen paid to online."

Republican political consultant Eric Porres of Pericles Consulting agreed that political advertising online will continue to grow in '06. But, he said, he wasn't counting on a breakout year, because many political advisers aren't yet familiar enough with online advertising. "As more people become familiar with it, more people will recommend it," he said. "I'm not waiting for it to be a banner year in 2006, but smart campaigns will be in it."

The panel consisted of Porres, Bassik, and Henry Copeland, the founder of the Blogads service, which allows advertisers to place ads on networks of subscribed blogs. Journalist and frequent OMMA magazine contributor Kate Kaye moderated.

Panelists said that online political campaigns can give candidates an extra edge over their opponents. Porres cited the Nebraska senatorial race, in which John Thune won a close victory over Tom Daschle--in that race, an online ad featuring Rudy Giuliani had a total number of click-throughs that was larger than the number of votes that decided the election.

Using the Los Angeles mayoral race as another example, Porres said that Bob Hertzberg, a Republican candidate for mayor, saw a 40 percent increase in his polling numbers based on his proposal to divide Los Angeles's school districts--a proposal that he had promoted heavily using an online ad campaign.

Ads on Web logs are an especially useful tool for targeting local, engaged audiences, said panelists. Pointing to a BlogAds reader survey that claimed that 70 percent of blog readers are the "influentials" coveted by advertisers, panel members said that blogs should be a major consideration for political campaigns. "If you're an advertiser, and you're trying to influence the influential, you've got to be there," said Bassik. And, although ads on blogs don't necessarily offer the reach of mass media, advertising to the influencers allows campaigners to "move the zeitgeist a little," Copeland said.

Candidates who are Internet-savvy, Bassik said, end up with a major edge over their less-Web-oriented opponents. "It's a huge edge," he said. "There are so many campaigns where online ads gave that initial boost the candidate needed."