The Intersection of Influencers & Politics

It’s Super Tuesday and SM4 Influencer Agency is taking a look at a burgeoning area with tremendous potential – the intersection of influencer marketing and political campaigns. There are opportunities for influencer companies to collaborate directly with a campaign or with a Political Action Committee, known as a PAC or Super PAC, that supports the candidate. It can be a rewarding experience to be part of a newsworthy, fast-moving and fun political campaign.

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The objective of political candidates is to reach local voters in an impactful fashion that moves minds and results in votes. Candidates craft or drop plans rapidly as they move state to state or town to town. Levels of donations and budgets vary like an unpredictable wild card. Politicians need to reach a target audience that is ever changing with each new territory.

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Influencer marketing is a flexible, cost-effective, localized tool for political candidates to meet these challenges and achieve these objectives. Deploying influencers is much more targeted, easier to plan, and affordable than a television advertisement, for example. Social media influencers have unique influence over their intimate audience who come to them for recommendations. A candidate can deploy influencers to target a city with influencers based in that city, attract young and independent voters through like-minded influencers, reach hard to find demographic segments, target voter groups by interest, and much more.

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Having deployed influencers to promote candidates in the 2020 and 2024 U.S. Presidential elections, SM4 Influencer Agency thought we would share our TOP THREE OBSERVATIONS …

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1.?? It’s hard. You will need extensive time and resources to scour each state for viable influencers. Plan for a 24/7 effort and start as soon as practical before the election. If you have access to an influencer network that will not be enough. Direct outreach influencer by influencer, location by location will be required. SM4 Influencer Agency has promoted U.S. Presidential candidates in eight states:? New York, New Hampshire, Wyoming, Utah, Minnesota, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and South Carolina. We have found that 95% of viable influencers decline our offer because they do not post about politics. Some of the remaining five percent support another candidate. Many of the influencers who rejected our offer said they feared losing followers if they get political.?It is achievable and impactful, but plan for this obstacle.

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2.?? It takes finesse. You can save some deals where the influencer’s gut reaction is “No. I don’t do politics.” Explain to these influencers that they do not need to mention which candidate they are voting for if that is what they prefer. While the majority of influencers will give a full-throated endorsement of the candidate, these influencers can just stress the importance of voting in the upcoming election and knowing the candidates, and drive their audience to a link to check out more about the sponsoring candidate, perhaps with a snippet about their biography.

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3.?? No state is the same. Each state varies dramatically. At a more local level, every city or town varies as well. For example, let’s compare two states that come up early in a U.S. Presidential Primary, South Carolina and New Hampshire. While South Carolina has five times as many registered Republicans compared to New Hampshire, the two states have around the same number of undeclared voters.?This will surely be relevant for the client’s audience targeting, influencer type and messaging. When running a political influencer campaign, know your location and its statistics before you plan your strategy.

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We encourage influencer marketing companies and political campaigns to get together and discuss collaborations. To dive deeper, [email protected].