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« The Iowa Ad Campaign
The Iowa Ad Campaign
DEMOCRACY IN ACTION
feature made
possible thanks to Jennifer
Glover
Konfrst, assistant professor of public relations at Drake
University.
WORKING
DRAFT
Overview
The charts on the pages that follow aims to give a sense of what TV
ads
the campaigns, super
PACs and other groups were running in the final two months of the
Iowa caucus
campaign.
While the ground game and retail politics are critical in Iowa and
there is considerable talk about the declining effectiveness of TV
advertising, the
campaigns, their allies and interested groups did not neglect the air
war.
News programming is prime territory for political advertisers.
Looking at local evening news, Des Moines viewers have a number of
choices. WHO Channel 13 (NBC) has News at Four (one hour), News
at 5 (half hour), News at 6 (half hour) and News at 10. KCCI
Channel 8 (CBS) has 6 and 10 p.m. newscasts anchored by Kevin
Cooney (>).
WOI
Channel
5
(ABC)
has 5, 6 and 10 newscasts anchored by Stephanie
Angleson (>).
Different
newscasts
have
different
audiences
and ratings. For example, a 5
p.m.
broadcast would have more retired people and stay-at-home moms among
its viewers, while the 6 p.m. and 10 p.m. broadcasts would draw people
who have come home from work.
The charts are based on a review of the 9 p.m. local
newscast "News at 9 on Fox 17"
airing on Channel 13 KDSM-TV in Des Moines,
comprising a
total block of time of about 62-63 minutes each day over the month
leading
up to Feb. 1. I selected this broadcast after looking at the FCC
political files for Des Moines area stations and noticing that a lot of
campaigns and groups seemed to be making buys on it.
Details
The sample includes eight ad breaks from during the newscast, and a
ninth ad break from the conclusion of the broadcast and leading up to
the next program, the comedy "Two Broke Girls." On many Saturdays
and Sundays there were abbreviated half-hour broadcasts.
Typical ad breaks went for two or three minutes, comprising four
30-second
spots and promos for FOX programming. In an ad break one might
see up to two-and-a-half minutes of
ads. The opening ad break only had one minute of ads. In
addition to the standard 30-second spots there were one-minute
spots, 15-second spots
(usually two 15-second spots from the same advertiser were run in an ad
break, one at the beginning and one at the end) and 10-second
spots.
As noted there
were
numerous promos for FOX programming. Many of the promos were for junk
TV including Jerry
Springer, The Big Bang Theory, Celebrity Name Game, People's Court, and
Family Feud
as well as for Comet [scifi
channel on KDSM2]. None of these promos
are considered in this review.
The sample picked up with the ad campaign already underway.
Earlly on there were some isolated buys. T he campaign of Sen. Ted Cruz
(R-TX) was first go on air in the 2016 cycle, running a 30-second TV
spot called "Blessing" in the four early states and nationally on Fox
News over Easter weekend, April 3-5, 2015. The first major super
PAC ad buy came from the pro-Perry Opportunity and Freedom PAC, a
30-second TV spot running in Iowa starting June 5. The Carson
campaign reported running ads in Iowa starting Aug. 7, but then did not
run ads on this broadcast for a while.. The Clinton campaign
started its advertising in Iowa on Aug. 4,
2015, the pro-Bush super PAC Right to Rise USA on Sept. 15, the Sanders
campaign at the beginning of Nov. 2015, the Rubio campaign released its
first early state television ad on Nov. 24, and the Trump campaign
started its advertising in Iowa on Jan. 5, 2016.
Limitations
Keep in mind that this is a
very limited sample: one broadcast on one
station in one media market in Iowa. No conclusions about the
overall Iowa ad campaign can be drawn
from this survey. The survey does not say anything about
the amount of
advertising the various campaigns
and groups were doing; one can only tell how much they were doing on
this one program. A campaign could have a strategy of
focusing on other markets, for example Cedar Rapids, or other stations
in the Des Moines market, or other types of programming.
Campaigns target their buys using data from firms such as
Scarborough
Research which allow media buyers to drill down and target blue collar
workers or single women or higher income viewers or other demographics
as desired. Reviewing
larger blocks of time and/or other program segments, on other stations
in Des Moines, on stations in other Iowa
markets, would have produced a chart with more
political
ads and a different mix of
political ads.