Politics, polls, and persuasion
OAKVILLE, ONT.—This might surprise you, but when the next federal election rolls around, I doubt our political parties will be airing many media ads designed to persuade voters to change their minds. They rarely do. Okay, I know that sounds strange, since, after all, persuading people is supposedly what politics is all about, so let […]
What Canadian politicians can learn from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s advertising strategy
During the 2019 federal election cycle, Canada’s three major political parties spent more than $26-million on television and online advertising. Whereas the theoretical purpose of this spending is to increase widespread participation in our democracy, it’s hard to say whether it’s having any discernible impact. The $26-million question is, then, do you recall any of […]
Lewis courts dairy farmers, Sloan attacks WHO as Conservative leadership underdogs burn through cash in late advertising push
Underdog candidates Leslyn Lewis and Derek Sloan have begun using paid online ads to promote their campaigns to win the Conservative Party leadership, and have grabbed the attention of hundreds of thousands of Canadians as the party’s election date draws near, while front-runners Peter MacKay and Erin O’Toole appear to have shifted their focus to […]
Digital ads the story of election 2019 budgets, say campaign vets
A shift towards even more digital advertising is the most likely change to the way the parties will spend their money during this fall’s election campaign, say veterans of previous campaigns with the Liberals, Conservatives, and NDP. “I suspect digital is going to become more and more the battleground. That’s where more campaigns should be […]
Liberal election ad ‘head and shoulders’ above Tory, NDP offerings, says U.S. campaign guru
Political advertising experts are giving a thumb’s-up to the Liberal Party’s election ad featuring Prime Minister Justin Trudeau riding a bus, with one calling it “head and shoulders” above English-language ads released recently by the Conservatives and NDP. The minute-long Liberal ad is available on social media, and has been running on television, sometimes spliced […]
Don’t worry, political ads still work
OAKVILLE, ONT.—A poll came out recently which, if taken at face value, would be bad news for all the good people in this country who write political advertisements for a living. The poll in question, conducted by Forum Research, asked Canadians if any of the political advertisements they’d seen over the past month had an […]
Political ads reaching Canadians, who say they have ‘no impact’: poll
Nearly two-thirds of Canadians said they had seen a political advertisement in the past month, suggests a new poll by Forum Research, but eight in 10 of them say the ads had little or no impact on their opinions. The poll by Forum Research used an interactive-voice response system to survey 1,733 Canadians across the […]
NDP hits pause on ads, Grits and Tories suspend TV campaigns as pre-election spending cap, summer doldrums kick in
The NDP says it has temporarily stopped running political ads on Facebook and elsewhere fewer than 100 days before the federal election, leading one conservative-tied digital strategist to suggest the party is in deep trouble, and a former NDP national director to predict the party is saving its ammunition for closer to the election. “The […]
Engage Canada won’t run more attack ads before election
Left-leaning political messaging group Engage Canada won’t be running any more ads attacking Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer before the upcoming election, say Unifor national president Jerry Dias and another source close to the organization. “Engage is finished,” said Mr. Dias in a phone interview with The Hill Times last week. Another source close to Engage […]
Federal government ad spending rises after PM’s department bumps up limit 45 per cent in election year
The federal government is expected to spend about 60 per cent more on advertising in 2018-19, the last fiscal year before an election, than the year before, thanks to an increase to the ad spending limit by the Privy Council Office. The Canada Revenue Agency is one of the departments to have taken advantage of […]
