The primary season will be remembered for many things, including the drawn-out Democratic contest, John McCain’s surprising comeback, and the number of presidential hopefuls appearing on “Saturday Night Live.” But among media people what stands out is the huge amount of ad spending. It was the most expensive primary season ever, owing partly to the down-to-the-wire fight between Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, the eventual winner. TNS Media Intelligence’s Campaign Media Analysis Group reports that more than $520 million has been spent on political campaigns thus far this year, with some $200 million alone on TV ads by the candidates. Obama outspent everyone, including the Republican candidates combined, with $78 million in TV ads, while Clinton spent $49 million. Republicans combined for $57 million. Much less has gone to the internet, where Obama was again the most active, though this could change in future campaigns. All told, politicals are on pace for at least $3 billion in spending this year, including issue ads and congressional races. Evan Tracey, chief operating officer of CMAG, talks to Media Life about Obama’s state strategy, when the next surge in spending will come, and what role the 527s will play.

 
We’re finally through the primary season. What were the biggest surprises that you saw in campaign spending?
 
There were surprises. I think it netted out with our forecast, but a surprise was the money the candidates raised. Obama spent over $75 million, and it was a surprise that he and Sen. Clinton went wire-to-wire on this thing.

Typically presidential primaries kind of wrap up about a quarter of the year through, sort of like we saw with the Republican race.
 
We felt like the amount that was eventually spent would be right around where it ended up, we just thought it would come from different players, with more coming from the Republican side.
 

When will we start to see the next surge in spending for the presidential election?
 
Well, it’ll be a steady build up from the presidential candidates themselves. McCain has spent about $4 million in the last three weeks, with daily spending now at about half a million. And it shouldn’t be long before Obama joins this.
 
The other side of it is, you’ll see the parties and groups start to engage as well, so the fact that Democrats’ primary process went as long as it did probably means the general election spending will start to blare pretty quickly and go through the conventions and into the elections.
 

Are we still on track for the biggest political year ever?
 
I think so. There’s nothing I’ve seen that backs me down. We think there will be $800 million spent in the presidential race.
 
All told there should be $3 billion spent for all the races, with about a third directly related to the presidential race.
 

Hillary Clinton's campaign notably did not spend all that much of her money online. Do you think online generally will see a spending surge this fall?
 
Nobody spent a lot online. Obama spent about $3 million by our estimation. McCain spent very little, as did Clinton. The candidates are going to use online advertising until it stops raising money, and then it will drop off the cliff, because it’s not really a messaging tool.
 
The thing they’ll use more is their own web sites, emails and sites like Facebook, etc., but they won’t devote millions to online until somebody does it and wins an election. This will still be a TV-driven election.
 
Obama stayed with online because he was raising money with it. We looked back and generally what we’ve seen is online ad spending drops off when you get to June and July, and that’s when campaigns shift away from fundraising to more messaging.
 

When do you expect interest group advertising to really kick up? Will this spending be greater than 2004?
 
I think it will be greater than ‘04 only because this is the way campaigns go.

The Obama campaign has said that they would rather people who want to be involved in 527s [tax-exempt organizations not regulated by the Federal Election Commission] give the money to the party instead, and I think that’s a signal they want control over their message.
 
McCain may need the 527s to play the sort of “bad cop” role.

I think his campaign will need some help with some of the more negative messages, which generally come from 527s. But the caveat is any 527 that runs ads that support Sen. McCain will probably be scolded by him, because he’s not a fan of these things.
 
Just a sidebar, to the extent that 527s decide to stay out of the race, they’ll just redirect that money to House and Senate seat races.

The Democrats want to see a veto-proof majority in the Senate, and Republicans are looking for any firewall they can to remain in power for next year.
 

What media (TV, online, cable, etc.) are seeing the biggest boost over 2004?
 
Well, the media will shakeout as local broadcast TV first, and beyond that national cable should do well in the presidential context. Local cable will do very well in state and local races, and I think after that radio will be well positioned, and then probably the internet.
 
That’s generally how these things shake out, and I don’t see the internet leap-frogging any of the other media this election, but it will continue to close the gap. Whatever we learn this election [in regards to the internet and campaigning] will be the basis for the next election.
 

Local media buyers say Obama spent good amounts of money on radio stations that don’t typically attract political dollars, such as young-skewing urban stations. Do you see that trend continuing?
 
I do.

For Obama, right now, his efforts have to be interpreted as one part innovative, and one part having more money than there is TV time to buy.

A lot of the radio is going on because he has literally bought as much as he can on TV, and this is the spillover.
 
But one thing he’s done a good job of is, you’ve got two key voting blocks, baby boomers and their children. As boomers move closer to retirement and their children move up in the job market, they have a lot of the same issues they care equally about, but they consume media differently.

And I think one of the things Obama has done very well is hit all the different sorts of media that talks to both of those voting blocks.
 
They’ve done what they can to talk to baby boomers through things like appointment viewing and newspapers, whereas their kids don’t watch anything unless it’s on YouTube or TiVo, and they listen to different radio stations and new media like podcasts.

But Obama’s done well at touching all of the bases, thus expanding the radio playing field. He’s even used younger voice talent for the ads that run on younger-skewing stations.
 

Which states will see the biggest ad spend by the candidates come fall?
 
It will be usual suspects, the Ohios, Floridas, Pennsylvanias and Michigans, as well as New Mexico and Iowa.

But I think one of the things Obama will do is use money to stretch the battleground. So, as opposed to being a 15-state race, he could spend in as many as 35 states, if nothing else to make McCain’s finances that much more stretched.
 
I think Obama will have all the money he needs to compete in the traditional battleground states, but he’ll also have the money to stretch it out into others in an effort to try and mitigate losing some of those states he needs to win.
 
It’s very similar to the strategy he used with Clinton in Pennsylvania.

He spent $10 million in a state he was probably never going to win, but he caused Clinton to spend about $4.5 million of her own money on advertising. He didn’t need to do well there, but he was able to put his resources to work and make her spend money she didn’t have. By doing that she couldn’t do much by way of campaigning in North Carolina and Indiana and translate the Pennsylvania victory into any kind of momentum
 
If McCain has to start spending in places like Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky and even Arizona, that will really strap him for states like Ohio, Florida, etc.
 
It’s a situation where the money can play a really big advantage.