The next president won’t be determined for two more weeks, but in terms of media strategy, one candidate already looks like the winner: Democrat Barack Obama. With more money, more fund-raising and a more comprehensive media strategy, Obama has simply had more opportunity to try new things. He has a larger web presence than Republican rival John McCain, he became the first presidential candidate ever to place an in-game video ad last week, and he has negotiated a half-hour primetime ad on CBS, NBC and Fox to air next week. By refusing to take the public funding that has limited McCain, Obama has also been able to launch a counteroffensive against his rival in Republican-leaning states where McCain would not otherwise have spent money. McCain has thus been forced to pour some of his limited funds into traditionally red states instead of spending that money in battlegrounds like Ohio and Florida. Aaron Cohen, executive vice president and chief media negotiator at Horizon Media, talks to Media Life about the candidates’ media strategies, this campaign’s many innovations, and the wisdom of a broadcast media buy. 

 
Address each candidate's buying strategy for the 2008 presidential election.
 
Well, let me start with Obama since he has the most money. He spread the money very, very well across the internet, local TV stations and national broadcast. But national broadcast is in third position.

They started spending early, and spent heavily right through the primary races. There was a dip after the last primaries before the [conventions], but they picked up just as McCain did with that big buy during the Olympics. So there has been a consistent campaign, and there’s been very little repeat or wear-out of commercials.

And the messages have been balanced, I should say from what I’ve seen, across various demographic groups, covering many different areas of the economy, as well as health, childcare and family.
 
McCain, with less money to spend, has had a harder time being visible, except for making the Olympics buy after Obama.

And he hasn’t used the internet quite as broadly as Obama, and that’s almost logical because a great deal of Obama’s support is from younger voters. McCain’s strategy, supported by his 529s, has been more negative in tone and attacking in tone. There also seems to be less clarity on general issues, and I don’t think it’s been as effective.
 

Which candidate has demonstrated the most effective use of media?
 
Obama. While there’s this whole mystique about the value of attack advertising and people are saying it’s highly effective, personally I think it’s so demeaning to a candidate and a waste of a candidate’s time and money, making its long-term value questionable.
 
It goes back to the last Bush versus Kerry election. They did a pretty slanderous job on Kerry, so you could say it has an effect, but it really appeals to the lowest level of politics in my opinion. For the intelligent voter I believe it really has to be rejected because most of those attacks are not based on truth but hearsay or conjured-up fact.
 

Obviously Obama has a huge money advantage; some are saying he won't even be able to spend it all before the election. How does this compare to past presidential spending sprees?
 
This has been extraordinary, having raised more than twice as much as any other presidential candidate in history. So this was going to be a total blast.

I don’t know what the final tallies will show, but if what the papers this morning are saying is correct and Obama raised $150 million [last month], it’s just an indication of how desperate some people in this country are to support the idea of change.
 

Obama plans to address the nation on at least three broadcast networks on Oct. 29. Is this an effective media buy? Why haven't we seen the strategy used more often since Ross Perot did it 16 years ago?
 
I don’t think there have been very many campaigns that have generated the degree of interest across the country as this one. And I think it will show with record voter turnout, so that investment, which is probably about $3 million for that half hour, is probably going to draw a larger audience for an unchallenged half-hour opportunity to talk to interested Americans, especially the youth.
 
It’s his final opportunity to get the undecideds and independents to fall on his side of the fence. He has adequate time to cover virtually all the critical areas, starting with a country that starts with an I and ends with a Q [Iraq], which wasn’t even brought up in the last debate.

There can be information rather than broad headlines, and I hope that’s what he does, and I’m not a part of this team.
 

Obama also bought time on video games, a first, and made other digital media buys. Do you think these innovative strategies will help, or are they just throwing money away?
 
It’s stretching to reach every possible avenue. I can’t believe the investment was very large, but it got more press because of the innovation. That press has probably made the investment level five to 10 times that amount.

Again, it says to the young people, “This is a forward-thinking, could-be my-kind-of-guy, because, wow, that’s pretty original and aggressive.”
 

How has online buying differed from the 2004 presidential election? Has it reached levels people expected it to?
 
I have no handle on the amount of investment at this point, but Obama has been consistent. His web site is updated on a regular basis and I believe it’s had more visits than McCain’s, but again I’m not speaking from hard numbers.

There is going to be a period of evaluation following the election to figure out the return on investment, and I think it will be a while before we hear about how effective the internet was versus cable news networks, entertainment channels and local television.
 

What has been the impact of the election on late-night ad buys?
 
That’s a hard one to answer.
 
One thing I can say is that in cities across the country, the revenue that will be derived from McCain and Obama for advertising up to Nov. 4 will sustain local station sales projections into fourth quarter, which would have been miserably short because of the cutbacks in auto and factory advertising. Without this, many local stations would be in difficult economic situations.
 

The word was that Obama would spend heavily in traditionally red states, if nothing more than to force McCain to spend in states he normally wouldn’t have to. That has happened more in the past few weeks, what do you think of that strategy?
 
You’re absolutely right. Obama was advertising in Florida when McCain was not in sight. There was no McCain advertising down there.

Ohio has been huge in terms of Obama, and then McCain came in behind him in the state. They’ve got to eventually go to where he is spending money to counter that, and frankly I think it’s those light blue and light red states that will see the last influx of money.

Both candidates will be spending right up and through Nov. 4.