‘Marketing Mar Roxas for president’
Q: We’re a group of political science students. We’ve long been fascinated with your social marketing especially during the time when you analyzed the leading candidates in the last presidential election.
You made so much political sense that we chose not to listen to our professor who obviously had such low respect for marketing when he said to us: “Why are you all wasting your time with a dabbler in political science?” But last Friday there you were again writing a “trivia” that’s not at all a trivia saying: “Isn’t this just the kind of campaign idea that Mr. Mar Roxas needs for his presidential goal?
Can you imagine how much potential voting points he is to gain when he does something like this on the polluting buses even just in Metro Manila?”
Please sir, what really was that all about?
A: First of all, we congratulate you for seeing through that trivia. And we’d like to answer your question. That’s even if we risk annoying once more your professor by our “dabbling” in political science. So here’s the entire context of that trivia.
We’ve been asked by the same politicians who invited us to do that analysis of “the leading candidates in the last presidential election” to analyze this time who’s likely to succeed P-Noy. We declined the invitation but the question never left us and we found ourselves more and more concerned.
So we’d like to answer your question by applying our social marketing “model of voter choice behavior” for a president as applied to Mr. Mar Roxas. By the way, this same model can be used for any other candidate or candidates you may want to analyze in terms of his or her chances for being the country’s president come election time.
We have to say that because you might think that this is a disguised campaign piece for Mr. Roxas. It’s not. Maybe in the next column, we’ll take on another aspiring presidential candidate or one we really believe should campaign.
Anyway, we’ve used our model of voter choice behavior since President Cory’s term. And we’ve used it for successfully predicting both winners and losers in the presidential, senatorial, gubernatorial and city mayor races.
In the science of prediction that’s what is called “a robust model.” In the present case of electing a president, our model says: “The candidate that’s able to build and sustain over the campaign period a singular capability image that resonates with the voters’ priority attribute for a president will win. Conversely, the candidate that insists on his multiple capabilities even when true or shifts capability image over the campaign period will lose.”
P-Noy won by being true to that model. He stood against corruption from the very start and sustained that throughout the campaign period. But was the corruption issue the top priority concern of the voting population at that time?
The SWS and Pulse Asia survey both said it was not. It was below the top three priority voter concerns. Our memory seems to say that it was about the voters’ 6th or 7th priority. So does this negate the validity of our prediction model?
Well not so fast. To win, P-Noy did not have to have even a majority or more that 50 percent share of votes. He just needed a plurality share of votes to win. Secondly, when voters were asked in the survey about their priority concerns there was no follow up question on which concerns did they see as under the control of the government or the president of the country. But corruption was something the government and specifically the president can do something about … for better or for worse and we suppose you know who we’re talking about “for worse” and who “for better.”
We now move on to Mr. Roxas. He is an intriguing case. He was the no. 1 most voted senator. How come? From the marketing perspective, it was because he was able to build and sustain over the senatorial campaign period a singular capability image that resonated with the voters’ priority attribute for a senator.”
Of course, that’s the “Mister Palengke” image which was meaningful to those who voted him as their top no. 1 senator. The contrast to this imaging strategy was Senator Ed Angara when he explored his chances for presidency and then as vice president both of which he lost.
Why? Again, just limiting ourselves again to the marketing perspective, it was because in the TV version of his “test campaign” Senator Angara insisted on his multiple capabilities (six of them) even when they were all true. If he had chosen as he was advised to (we learned from our friends in the advertising community) to go for a singular capability image as Mr. Education, for example, he would have had a real fighting chance.
So what about Mr. Roxas for president and the idea of making a singular capability image this time as a Mr. Anti-Carbon Emission? First of all, carbon emission is getting to be priority concern among more and more pedestrian and commuting voters. That’s a large voting block. If it’s not yet on top of the list of voters’ concerns, it’s easy to bring it there or near there in the minds of voters. Secondly, there has been nothing or practically nothing even slightly effective in the drive to control carbon emission especially from the biggest source, name buses. Thirdly, the image fits very well in Mr. Roxas’ position as Secretary of Transportation. Fourthly, control of carbon emission via converting just buses first into electric buses is the most cost-effective carbon emission control method.
When focused first on buses, the cost-effectiveness comes from two sources. It’s cost effective when it’s done along the system that the Shai Agassi’s Better Place Inc. set-up in Israel. That consisted essentially of battery switching stations operating like car washes.
Last Friday’s column gave the details of how that system will work. The second source of cost-effectiveness comes from the fact that buses follow a fixed daily route. Therefore, those battery switching stations need not be fixed which is expensive but can be mobile like a shuttle truck bringing those batteries for switching from one bus loading or unloading point to another.
So there you are. It’s a singular capability image that’s not just an image but a delivered, cost-effective, and media friendly Mr. Anti Carbon Emission Control! A surer or at least a better than chance way to get Mr. Roxas the needed plurality share of votes as the next country’s president. And your political science professor can eat his heart out!
Keep your questions coming. Send them to us at [email protected] or [email protected]. God bless!
