• by Mark Walsh  @markfwal, March 4, 2008

A white paper released today by George Washington University's Institute for Politics, Democracy, and the Internet estimates that political marketers spend an average of only 1.6% of their budget online, compared with about 7% by commercial advertisers. Political ad spending online is expected to total only $73 million this year.

The paper, titled Best Practices for Political Advertising Online, advises that campaigns spending $1 million on traditional advertising should be willing to spend from $50,000 to $100,000 in online media to meet the industry standard mix.

"Campaigns are playing it safe and sticking to what they know at this point, and what they know is advertising on mainstream media such as TV," said Julie Barko Germany, director of the Institute. While campaigns are increasingly embracing online outlets such as blogs and social networking sites to build grassroots support, the Internet still attracts few ad dollars.

"The political consulting community still says: 'If I want to reach and persuade voters, I have to do it on TV,'" Germany said. A January study by Borrell & Associates came to a similar conclusion, estimating the Internet would garner just $20 million of the $5 billion in political advertising bought this year.

However, "what we're really finding is that people are just consuming media in so many different ways today and the Internet has become one of the biggest sources for people to get political information," Germany said.

To make better use of the Web, the George Washington report suggests that political marketers start small by placing ads on search engines and blogs to reach early supporters and "influentials" before moving on to targeted banner advertising. Because of the wide array of online ad options, campaigns should take at least three weeks to map out a Web strategy.

In relation to the major online ad categories, the Institute for Politics offered the following guidelines for political marketers:

Search

• Advertise on Google, Yahoo and MSN.
• Buy keywords for opponents' names as well as your own candidate's name, and keywords linking a candidate's name to key issues.
• Use post-click conversion tracking to measure the actual cost per sale or per donation. 
• Paid online political advertising in 2008 will surpass that of all previous elections combined, but will still represent only a small fraction of political ad dollars overall, according to a new report.
• Create landing pages with compelling reasons for people to take action.

Online Display Advertising

• Use display ads in concert with other components of an online plan and as part of a wider integrated media campaign.
• Work with established professionals and organizations that understand the complexity of online advertising and the sensitivity of political communications.

Lead Generation

• Define campaign performance criteria.
• Use top lead-generation companies to build a direct marketing campaign and monitor performance in real-time.
•  Develop a privacy policy and terms and conditions that disclose how consumer data is collected, used and shared.

Because of the fluid nature of political campaigns, the paper also advises that standard online ad contracts include immediate cancellation clauses in the event that a candidate drops out or shifts strategy abruptly.

Whether 2008 turns out to be a breakthrough year for online political advertising remains to be seen, according to Germany. "It could be the year that online political advertising takes off, but it's going to take a campaign winning in a major way or doing something spectacular closer to the general election that involves online advertising," she said.

The white paper on online political advertising was sponsored by ValueClick Media and Google and included participation from the Interactive Advertising Board, the E-Voter Institute, MSHC & Partners, Goodway Group and Connell Donatelli.