Unity/altruism appeal ads that ask people to help us and others and vote for us.
One thing I really never see is messages in which well known leaders in the Dem party (particularly people like Obama, Clinton, Sanders, etc.) all speak together and simply ask people to help us by voting.
Anyway, it's a different communications world out there now, and we can actually define ourselves better by speaking up frequently from a unified, central source. That makes it harder for others to define us. Trump, of all people, is demonstrating this. Trump uses Twitter and televised rallies to lie and manipulate "directly from the horse's mouth." In today's communication environment, that is apparently exceptionally effective. It gives Trump huge rhetorical mindshare traction even against colossal (in terms of reliability and credibility) fact sources like NYT and WashPo.
We need to steal a page or two from that playbook—not the lying and manipulation, of course, the direct communication. We need to directly communicate (and frequently) that we are good people. Otherwise we are vulnerable to outside reputation manipulation against us. If Trump effectively disputes fact-oriented, rational sources like NYT and WashPo with help from Fox News and Russia, we can effectively dispute Fox News and Russia with the help of fact-oriented, rational sources like NYT and WashPo.
Finally, persuasion by logical and even impassioned rhetoric alone is very difficult when people don't know who to trust and are being messaged as if they are hearing only from "what's in it for me" and "who should I dislike" perspectives. If we address them only from those perspectives, that will strengthen only those perspectives. Here I am talking about ads that say, "women, you should be angry...sick and old people, you should be afraid because you're going to lose out." Those messages are both true (in my opinion) and important, of course.
But the other side of the coin is that people like to help other people whom they like and whose ideas they agree with, whether they, themselves, get personal benefit or not. A lot of people, particularly of our Dem/left leaning variety respond to true altruism in other words. Therefore, the message, "help us please," is important. Even if someone isn't a woman or old or sick, the message "you can vote and help women, the old, and the sick," is an important message.
We're good people. We're together. We want to do x, y, and z. We need your help. Please vote for us in November. Please visit xyz.com for the names of the candidates we are running on your local ballots or text "link" to 555555 for a link to be sent to your phone. We promise we won't pester you. I nominate Sarah Silverman to write and direct.
= new reply since forum marked as read
