We tested 38 US election ads. Hope is beating hate
Daivid’s Ian Forrester has run the US election campaigns through extensive creative effectiveness testing to see how they make people feel. He posits that there is an opportunity for a change of tone.
Words matter. For anyone in the advertising industry, we know all too well the power of a well-crafted message. But sometimes we need a reminder. In the US, we saw firsthand the power words can have during the January 6 attack on the Capitol building. And then there were the recent UK riots.
You ask yourself how this can happen in 2024 then you remember the political soundtrack of the last few years–the words, the language and the tone used by people in the pursuit of power. Of course, we have been here before.
So, as the race for the White House hots up, it’s quite depressing to once again see some of the content that is currently being pushed out across both US Presidential candidates’ digital channels.
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As we know, online platforms such as TikTok are a key battleground in this year’s US Presidential race – ‘battleground’ being the operative word. Take a look at the various online ads and TikToks being pushed out by the various official campaign accounts and their associated Super-PACS and it’s hard not to summarise that the resounding message at this year’s election appears to be, “vote for me because I am not as bad as the other person”.
To understand the scale of the issue and its impact, at Daivid, we used our advanced creative testing technology to measure the emotional responses and attention levels of 1,006 US viewers to content created in support of the two candidates to become the next US president across YouTube, TikTok, X and Instagram. Altogether, 38 videos were included in the analysis.
We found quite a stark difference in the emotions generated by the two presidential candidates’ campaigns and the feelings generated by the average US ad.
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Viewers watching the campaigns were, on average, more than twice as likely to feel anger (+135%) and disgust (+130%) than they would watching the average US ad.
37% were more likely to feel anxious and 44% were more likely to feel scared. They were also 22% more likely to make viewers sad and 3% less trustworthy. Overall, similar to the UK general election earlier this summer, the US election content was 15% more likely to generate intense negative emotions than the US average and 4.4% less likely to generate positive feelings.
To put it in context, only five of the 38 videos tested were above the US norm for feelings of admiration, eight for pride, six for inspiration, and, rather tellingly, seven for feelings of hope. Meanwhile, all but three made people more anxious than average, while three-quarters of the ads tested generated above-average levels of anger.
Now, I’m not naive. I know that negative emotions can be a powerful motivator for people to act in the lead-up to polling day. After all, you need to fire up your base to make sure they get out to vote.
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But what’s also interesting is that the levels of engagement are also lower than the US norm. The videos generated on average generated 6.4% less attention than the average ad, while viewers were also less likely to share the ad online (-6.6%), recommend it to a friend (-5.5%) or search the web to find out more (-4.0%) than they would for a commercial brand.
That’s not to say both parties are equally guilty as the next. Both Democratic nominee Kamala Harris and her Republican rival Donald Trump’s campaign videos are, on average, below the norm for positive emotions and above the line for negative emotions.
However, when you compare the two, Harris’ campaign videos were overall more likely to attract more intense positive emotions from viewers. This includes strong feelings of trust (+4%), admiration (+19%), amusement (10%) and hope (+20%). Meanwhile, Trump’s campaign content was more likely to make viewers feel sad (+18%), scared (+11%) and bored (+4%).
Of the top 12 videos that generated above-average levels of trust, nine were from the Harris campaign, while of the eight videos that generated higher-than-average feelings of pride, only one came from the Republicans.
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Looking at the videos themselves, the most intense negative emotions were generated by ‘I Don’t Understand,’ posted on the Trump campaign’s YouTube channel. More than half (50.7%) who watched the video had an intense negative response to the content – 85% higher than the average US ad. This includes the highest levels of fear, anger, anxiety, disgust and sadness of any video tested. Harris’ TikTok video ‘Project 25 Is A Threat’ elicited the second highest levels of anger.
On the lighter side, ‘A Feminomenon,’ posted on the Harris campaign’s TikTok channel, was the funniest campaign video, generating 13.8% more amusement than the average US ad.
What’s interesting is that this slightly more positive approach also appears to have given the Harris campaign a slight edge when it comes to effectiveness, which could be crucial in a tight race.
While both were below the US norm, the Harris campaign videos generated 3% more attention overall. At the same time, viewers were also more likely to find out more, share or recommend the videos afterward.
Announcing Harris’ pick for VP this week, Tim Walz, the Democrats released a video profiling the other half of their ticket. The tone of the video was much more positive and heart-warming – we can hope this is only the start.
With users bombarded with misinformation and fake content almost daily, it’s important that candidates at least try to give some kind of vision of positive change in their messaging rather than just spending their media dollars focused on attacking their political rivals.
Like I said, words matter.