1. Each political advertising medium has its strengths and limitations – understanding them is key to deploying them smartly. Television’s strength is reaching large numbers of voters, especially less-engaged voters, but that doesn’t necessarily translate as well in low-turnout elections. David Perdue’s broadcast-focused Primary efforts may leave him with an engagement deficit to make up in the runoff election, which is expected to be even lower turnout.
Digital media can facilitate at least the appearance of direct personal engagement with voters and can be an important component of Get Out the Vote efforts, but it’s main strength may be the lower cost it allows a campaign to incur. Karen Handel’s campaign, which earned votes with significantly lower per vote spending than Perdue and Kingston shows both the advantage and the disadvantage of a digital-heavy campaign. Lower turnout in Metro Atlanta, where her margins were relatively high depressed her statewide vote total just enough to keep her out of the runoff.
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