Witty Ads Target Apathetic Voters

The message is simple: Your next senator could be as nondescript as a side of hash browns, a ceramic rooster, a yappy dog or even a battered relish packet. You won’t know unless you pay attention.

One of the 30-second political TV ads begins with soft piano music in the background and then the testimonials.

“I believe in Old Relish Packet,” a young man in flannel says in a Southern drawl.

“Old Relish Packet and I were trapped 50 miles behind enemy lines,” says an older man with a thick gray beard. “He saved my life.”

Narrated with the deep voice-of-God tone common in campaign ads, the Pay Attention public service advertisements began airing nationally on television in July. Each ends with a young woman asking: “If you’re not voting, then who are you electing?”

The agencies behind the ads hope humor will sell the message.

Such humor-based advertising is on the rise, according to Darrell West, professor of political science at Brown University and author of the book “Air Wars: Television Advertising in Election Campaigns.”

“There has been so much fear-mongering in recent years that I think voters appreciate a softer touch,” West said.

Politicians are catching on to the humor approach. In Connecticut, political newcomer Ned Lamont bested Sen. Joe Lieberman in the Democratic primary, in part, with campaign ads that made fun of Lieberman’s attack ads. The sarcastic commercials berated Lamont for being a bad karaoke singer and for making bad coffee.

“Satire is a great way to reach young people because it’s entertaining and engaging. It’s a way to get people involved in the political process who typically have not been very active,” West said. “Politicians will rely on humor and satire to make political points.”

The Pay Attention campaign developers agree. “We are saturated with the harsh reality of the news, especially when it comes to our own political choices that we make here in America,” said Dave Damman, senior vice president and executive creative director of WestWayne, the pro-bono advertising agency based in Atlanta that developed and produced the Pay Attention ads, which also include billboards, print, radio and Web advertising.

“Many people are scrambling; not only political candidates ... but marketers are scrambling to find what appeals to young people,” said Kenneth Dautrich, associate professor of public policy at the University of Connecticut.

Young voters in particular are cynical about politics, West said, so experimental methods are being tried to reach them.

“Over the last few years, there’s been a major effort to engage young people. There is generally about a 30% differential point between [voter turnout of] young people and senior citizens,” West said. “In an area of close elections, people think, ‘If we could just mobilize young people, it would make a big difference.’ ”

And then there’s the problem of media overload experienced by many people from multiple mediums -- TV, radio, Internet, newspapers, magazines, blogs and more.

In the Pay Attention campaign, the missing piece is the real candidates. “The overall purpose of using these [fake] candidates is to just break though the clutter,” said Will Thomason, executive vice president of WestWayne.

The campaign, like Comedy Central’s “Daily Show,” teams entertainment with information, said Michelle Hillman, Ad Council campaign director. The use of inanimate objects as candidates has a tone similar to the “Daily Show.”

“For young people who think ‘What’s the point?’ if they were going to see a typical ad that said ‘Go Vote,’ they might ... think of a way to counter it in their heads,” said Dannagal G. Young, assistant professor of communication at the University of Delaware. “[But] if their attention is grabbed by a joke, that might at least get through the first wall” of resistance.

A study conducted by the Annenberg Public Policy Center in 2004 found that people who watched the “Daily Show” were more politically informed, even when factors like initial interest in politics and exposure to traditional news programming were taken into account.

So humor in political advertising is useful well beyond the young voter demographic.

Political advertising runs five times more often than regular commercials, said Bill Hillsman, president and chief creative officer of North Woods advertising in Minneapolis, which created Ned Lamont’s campaign ads.

“Most political ads break all the rules of effective communication,” said Hillsman.

“If Pepsi makes a commercial for $400,000 or a million dollars, they are not stupid.... They are doing it because everybody is going to see it and ... they don’t have to run it a million times for everyone to notice,” he said.

The message of this ad campaign: A yappy dog might as well run for Congress if voters don’t pay attention to who’s on the ballot.