ADOI Blog

The Advertising of Politics – and the Advertising industry in Politics

mackattack on 04 23, 2008

The political climate has changed, and even the tone of formerly dismissive Ministers like Nazri Aziz has changed. Parliament is full of young firebrands waiting to unleash their venom, and equipping themselves to dig right into what they perceive to be a rot in a rotten government.

What has this — you might ask — got to do with those of us in the advertising fraternity? Actually, lots.

Many agencies do business with the Government and even more have accounts in Government-Linked Companies (GLCs) such as Petronas, TM and its subsidiary Celcom, Malaysia Airlines and more. The spending of the Ministries and GLCs will come under close scrutiny. This will include how these companies spend their money to market their brands and products. Ad agency money, will no doubt come under close scrutiny.

Many agencies will have nothing to worry at first glance. Their businesses are above board, and many would have won the accounts after a vigourous pitch against other top agencies.

However, what may come into question is how well have all these ad dollars been spent. How has the mere change of a logo and resultant million ringgit campaigns benefitted the company’s stakeholder – which includes Malaysia through the investment of their tax dollars in these companies?

These, and a lot of other very tough questions will be asked in the August House of Parliament, by new MPs who will be keen to impress upon their voters that they made the right choice, and they would make a better Government than the present. These MPs will be hoping to send the right messages out – a bit like branding themselves – and they will no doubt not be sparing in their research. Jeff Ooi, one of Malaysia’s top blogger is now an MP. If you have read his blog then you can expect the same meticulous research, and his own fiery brand of criticism in Parliament. He’s even ‘advertising’ for research assistants and ‘little birds’ – essentially whistle blowers – to contact him. His target is Petronas, and what is happening to the petrol dollars the company brings in.

Some of this money would have been spent on making the brilliant advertising during festive season. Many call them mini-movies, as the highly talented Yasmin Ahmad weaves a tale amidst brilliant cinematography that touches almost everyone I know, have met or have spoken to.

There is no denying that Yasmin more than earned the money paid for those commercials. What Petronas probably has to defend would probably be the amount of money spent on those campaigns, and how has it benefitted their bottom dollar. Was such spending for the entertainment of millions of Malaysians translated into millions of Malaysians preferring Petronas over, let’s say, Shell. If so how did you come by that fact?

Tough questions will see clients with connections to the Government starting to shy from big budget ‘brand equity building’ campaigns and go for a more hard sell campaign, with more discernable ROI to show the shareholders, one which happens to be answerable in Parliament.

Already, companies like Rapp Collins and SalesForce.Com are making inroads into clients like credit card companies, airlines, celcos and virtually any type of business with a database of customers. Sales campaigns have a habit of often making more sense – or at least more comprehensible – to most people. Brand building campaigns, despite many case studies – ironically many written by industry professionals – have yet to completely convince a lot of people. Many think it is an imprudent use of money, and only should be done to show off your profits in affording such spending.

So government, or government linked clients would prefer to go the safe way if for anything, for the sake of self-preservation. Will advertising spending drop? Will more money go to players bringing in new and more effective tools?

I don’t know. Do you?

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