The political marketing: understanding its approach and process

Abstract

Political marketing is a process of actions and strategies aimed at promoting a candidate, matching him to his potential electorate and developing his reputation with the greatest possible number of voters, while differentiating him from other parties or candidates, with the aim of optimizing the number of votes obtained, and subsequently winning the campaign.

Many analysts of the political scene limit the phenomenon of political marketing to advertising communications, when in fact the latter is only the tip of the iceberg of the political marketing approach. In fact, advertising communication is an important but insufficient element of political marketing, constituting just one of the 4Ps (Product, Price, Promotion (communication) and Place). For this reason, it is essential to understand the global approach to political marketing. This encompasses all stages of the strategic, operational and tactical marketing process. Strategic marketing is set up to conduct market research, after segmenting the market, positioning and targeting the party's target audience, with the aim of analyzing voters' needs and understanding their expectations, and then designing a political offering that best meets the needs of the target audience (voters), while operational and tactical marketing is set up for short-term actions, to manage unforeseen events and implement competitive intelligence actions (other competing political parties). In this article we will opt for a conceptual typology of our literature review, with the aim of pushing the traditional boundaries of political marketing literature by focusing on the ideas, concepts and process of the political marketing approach, rather than on linear narrative or the traditional aesthetic elements of political marketing.

Keywords: Political marketing, strategic political marketing, tactical political marketing, political segmentation, political positioning, political targeting, political mixed marketing

JEL Classification: M00, M3 

Paper type: Theoretical Research