political advertising

The Wall Street Journal reports that television still is far and away the dominant platform for groups trying to reach the biggest-possible audience of voters, but online ads are coming on strong. WSJ subscribers can read the full story here.

Super PACs are ascendant in this presidential campaign, raising more money and sometimes taking on more prominent roles than the candidates they support. But despite their gaudy fundraising and spending figures, the dollars they pour into TV advertising will only buy a fraction of the actual time on TV that the official campaigns can get themselves.

Broadcast political TV advertising will again grow for the 2015-2016 political season, which includes the presidential race. But in years to come, digital platforms will eat into its political advertising share, according to new research from Borrell Associates.

Political ad spending is expected to hit a record $11.4 billion in 2016, with more than $1 billion going to digital media for the first time ever, according to a Borrell Associates report.. However, that figure represents just 9.5% of the total spend, far less than the 30-40% advertisers in other categories spend on digital.

Already sick of hearing about data, the big buzzword during this year’s upfronts? Bad news: The incessant upfront chatter was just the beginning, as data blending and programmatic TV buying also looks to dominate the 2016 presidential campaign.

It’s over a year away, but the 2016 Presidential election is already coming into focus for marketers. And with the upcoming election has come an increased focus on programmatic ad technologies, which have long promised efficiencies in targeting precise audiences — exactly the type of thing political marketers aim to do.

The vast majority of political dollars will once again flow to broadcast next year, with cable getting the second-biggest share. Digital, by comparison, will get only a small sliver of spending despite the fact that many young people, the ones candidates want to get to the polls, now spend more time on digital than television.

Of that total, $3.3 billion is expected to go to local broadcast TV, $800 million in local cable TV ad spending for a share of 20% of all local buys. Despite the size of the battleground seemingly arguing for local buying, more national network and cable advertising is expected this time around.

In an election bursting with money from an expected 17 Republican presidential candidates and dozens of outside groups supporting them, NCC Media, the company that handles placement of political ads for most of the country’s cable systems, is already working out the puzzle of how to accommodate everyone.

Efforts to rein in money in politics might be considered dead on arrival in Congress since a Supreme Court decision opened the door to unlimited contributions to allies of presidential hopefuls. But in statehouses and city halls across the country, reform efforts are gaining traction. Overall, more than 125 bills dealing with campaign finance reform have been introduced in 33 statehouses in the past five months, and more have been introduced in cities as well.

Ted Cruz campaign ads will air this weekend on TV stations in Iowa, Nevada, New Hampshire and South Carolina, and on Fox News. The TV buy — estimated at $33,000 — is the first of the 2016 presidential campaign.

A petition before the FCC would make it easier for political candidates to get their ads on TV stations in the weeks before an election. Candidates are already guaranteed the lowest rate for such advertising. Under this new measure, political ads would be given favorable treatment over commercial ads.

Tribune Media CEO Peter Liguori can’t wait for the 2016 presidential race to begin in earnest. Tribune’s TV stations raked in about $150 million-$155 million in political ad dollars during the 2012 presidential election cycle. “We’re going to crush that number in 2016,” Liguori told the crowd Monday at a Morgan Stanley  investor conference in San Francisco.

The Koch brothers are planning to spend $889 million on the 2016 political campaign. There are those who see this as a terrible subversion of democracy. There are others who see it as a big waste of Charles (left) and David Koch’s money. Then there are the owners of television stations, who can be forgiven if they see the partisan zeal of the Kochs and other politically engaged billionaires as a great gift from heaven, or at least from the U.S. Supreme Court.

For all of the advances in the use of data and digital tools, broadcast advertising still claims the largest share of campaign budgets. Digital advertising is still a work in progress, especially at the level of House races and further down the ballot. Targeting voters with online ads is difficult, messy work, even under ideal circumstances. It can be easier to accomplish in statewide or national campaigns, where building a large enough audience is less of a problem.

It was interesting while it lasted, but the 2016 election is now officially “bought.” The purchasers are the Koch brothers, and the price, a cool $889 million. The news that the network organized by David and Charles Koch plans to spend roughly $900 million in the 2016 cycle has freaked out Democrats, outraged so-called campaign-finance reformers and inspired hand-wringing about the future of Earth.

Republican Texas gubernatorial candidate Greg Abbott’s team assembled a winning strategy featuring an integrated media marketing machine that included more for digital, less for TV. This story first appeared in TVNewsCheck’s Executive Outlook winter edition.

Ohio Gov. John Kasich’s landslide victory last week probably cost E.W. Scripps Co. $10 million in revenue this year from its WEWS Cleveland and WCPO Cincinnati.

Political ad spending has exploded since the 2010 Citizens United decision by the Supreme Court, which lifted bans on political spending by corporations. With lots of money flowing to special interest groups and candidates, every election cycle is sparking record spending, and this year is no different. Evan Tracey, SVP at National Media and former president at Kantar Media’s Campaign Media Analysis Group, talks about which states had the most spending, how spending compared to past years, and what to expect in 2016.

TV data and analytics firm Echelon Insights reports political advertisers spent a total of $69 million more on last-minute TV buying this midterm election cycle than they would have had they reserved ad space before October. The firm measured TV spending by political campaigns and advocacy groups on ads scheduled for October or early November through election day, today.

This year’s raft of political ads is being driven largely by super PACs and other independent groups seeking to shape the hard-fought battle over control of the U.S. Senate. While the volume of spots for House and governors’ races is down this fall compared with 2010, the number of Senate ads is up nearly 12%, according to a new analysis of Kantar data by the Wesleyan Media Project. The ads are a boon for TV  stations, which are struggling to retain their audiences. But one thing remains largely unchanged: the belief that television ads are the best way to reach voters

Many deep-pocketed political action committees want to keep buying TV ad time in a final push before Tuesday’s elections, as Democrats defend their Senate majority and Republicans drive for the six seats required to command it. But often there’s simply no ad time left. “Campaigns and third-party groups are finding it difficult to even find spots to purchase,” said Isaac Baker, who advises some of the Democrats’ heaviest spenders. “And they’re seeing rates climb from where they were last year or even earlier this year.”

The Sunlight Foundation, a nonpartisan nonprofit that advocates for open government, took a look at 30 minutes of local television — specifically, Philadelphia’s CBS-owned KYW. Researchers watched the station’s 6:00 p.m. newscast and found plenty of politics — in the form of nasty political ads — but absolutely no news coverage of the political races themselves.

What had been a slow year for New York City TV is heating up. While overall spending is down versus last year, inventory is suddenly tight due to high demand from political with Election Day less than two weeks away. TV spending in New York is down about 7% year-to-year, with pricing flat. Political spending was not a major factor for most of the year, but it got hot over the past few weeks.

The Campaign Legal Center, Common Cause and the Sunlight Foundation filed a complaint at the FCC alleging violations of long-standing rules and law by Sinclair ABC affiliate WJLA Washington. The complaint claims that WJLA continues to refuse to disclose the “true identity” of the sponsor of political ads being run by NextGen Climate Action Committee and asks for expedited action given that Election Day is just a few weeks away.

The pummeling of Colorado TV viewers by political ads will continue for another two and a half weeks. Colorado is on the national radar as a battleground state for key congressional and gubernatorial races — some of the closest in the country. Denver is among the top media markets by ad volume across all races, according to Kantar Media/CMAG. The market forecast for political TV advertising revenue is $50 million, says a Denver station manager.

Kansas has seen the greatest number of ads for state-level political office, such as lieutenant governors and state treasurers, from groups that do not disclose their donors. Secretive groups account for more than half of the spending in that state’s competitive race for governor. But, Kansas, is not alone. More than $9 million in ads have come from such anonymous groups in races for governor and state legislatures in 16 states, according to an analysis released today by the nonpartisan Center for Public Integrity. The bulk of the spending for next month’s elections is yet to come.

San Antonio has seen a huge amount of political spending so far this year, though the bulk of it was spent in the spring during primary season. San Antonio is healthy heading into the fall with TV spending flat to last year, driven by categories including auto, schools and telecom. Inventory will tighten as the November elections approach, though buyers don’t think it will be

With the midterm elections on the horizon, political marketers are preparing to make use of programmatic buying to reach their audiences. A new STRATA political survey says that 85% of political agencies plan to use programmatic for their political media-buying efforts this year. The company says the agencies polled represent roughly 75% of total political advertising billings.

Political dollars came in lower than expected to start the year. Meanwhile, other advertisers pulled back to avoid being caught up in political clutter that never came.

With fewer competitive races and the growth of political ads placed by outside groups, plus growing competition from digital, broadcast TV’s expected take of campaign money this election season have dipped. However, it remains the No. 1 choice, “it’s still the big play.”

Election Day is just two months off and the national tab for the 2014 campaign already stands at $1 billion. Before it’s all over, the bill for the first midterm election since both Democrats and Republicans embraced a historic change in campaign finance is likely to grow to $4 billion or more.

Spending is off from 2010 and 2012, with ballot issues in particular lagging behind. Still, $2.3 billion will be spent on mid-term elections, up 5% from four years ago.

Midterm elections are less than three months away, but there’s already a clear winner in 2014: digital advertising. A leading ad research firm recently estimated that more than $270 million will be spent across the country this cycle on digital campaign efforts — an 1,825% increase from 2010, when the first generation of tablet computers was just hitting the market.

For the first time, satellite broadcasters will be jockeying with other media outlets for a share of political spending that could top $3 billion this year. They’ve historically been shut out of the avalanche of campaign cash because their commercials were directed to a national audience, and didn’t have the local reach of TV and radio stations. But now they’re using digital technology to match voter registration information with subscriber homes, and are now offering political campaigns the ability to send targeted ads to select households.

An explosion of spending on political advertising on television — set to break $2 billion in congressional races, with overall spots up nearly 70% since the 2010 midterm election — is accelerating the rise of moneyed interests and wresting control from the candidates’ own efforts to reach voters.

Since digital was a proven winner in both of President Obama’s victories, what’s holding political campaigns back from increasing budget allocation to be more in line with consumer advertisers? Political strategists spend their careers finding the perfect balance of TV, direct mail and grassroots efforts to get their candidates elected. They aren’t paid to experiment. And despite its success, digital is sometimes still viewed as somewhat experimental. There are three main reasons why political campaigns stick with the status quo. Let’s debunk them.