Political Ad Targeting, Tied To Product Preference Data

With the first U.S. presidential debate now completed, targeted political advertising for President Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden may be more important than ever. The same goes for important “down-ballot” races across the U.S.

For candidates seeking to reach the right voter, there’s now a way to match electorate profiles based on their consumption preferences.

Thanks to programmatic advertising platforms, media buyers can target groups based on consumer preferences. And, this extends to declared political party affiliation.

For example, the Trump campaign could target its digital ads toward the profiles on the platform that are Diet Pepsi drinkers, as they are more likely to lean Republican.

Who knew that a diet soft drink consumer would be more pro-POTUS than for Biden?

Then, there’s the TV scenario: Democrats are 92% more likely to watch American Horror Story.

This is just a smattering of data offered by the Viant Advertising Cloud. With campaigns looking for new insights into voter preferences, examining the TV shows they’re watching to where they shop is now de rigueur. “Armed with this kind of first-party data, campaign advertisers can effectively reach specific constituents at this critical point in the election,” a Viant representative says.

The Advertising Cloud includes some 250 million people in the U.S. and, for the 2020 election, repeated some of the research steps it took in 2016 to match brands and TV programs with voters by political party preference.

While it doesn’t offer media buyers or planners terrific insights, it does help with scheduling ads on broadcast media and cable TV, giving a new bit of insight to radio AEs and GSMs that can demonstrate a good fit based on existing local and national spots.

In 2016, Viant noted that Republicans were diet soda drinkers. This remained true in 2020, with Republicans 84% more likely to prefer Coca-Cola Zero and 39% more likely to pick Diet Pepsi. They are only 8% more likely to drink Diet Dr. Pepper. On the other hand, Democrats in 2020 are more than two times more likely to prefer Crush and Fanta — brands popular with African-Americans and Hispanics, respectfully, based on historical research data conducted for Mintel.

Other interesting stats Viant found are as follows:

• Republicans are 25% more likely to own a dog and 27% more likely to own a cat; this is down from 41% and 32% in 2016. Furthermore, in 2016, Iams was a preferred dog food brand for Republicans, but in 2020, they were 54% more likely to prefer Hills Science Diet dog food.
• As imagined, TV viewing preferences are also pretty staggering. Democrats are more than eight times more likely to watch Sleepy Hollow, 92% more likely to watch American Horror Story-6, and 88% more likely to watch The Vampire Diaries. On the flip side, Republicans are more likely to watch the conservative-leaning Fox News programming, which was consistent with 2016 results.
• When it comes to snack preferences, Democrats are 21% more likely to prefer Wise Brands, 16% more likely to prefer Utz Brands, and 10% more likely to prefer Herr’s Brands, which was consistent with 2016. However, while Republicans preferred brands like Laughing Cow and Frigo in 2016, they are 56% more likely to prefer Sunchips Brands, 40% more likely to prefer Rold Gold Brands, and 21% more likely to prefer Tostitos Brands in 2020.
• Dish detergent may be the most polarizing stat yet both in 2016 and present. Democrats are 91% more likely to prefer Ajax Brands, down from 140% in 2016, while Republicans are 44% more likely to prefer Finish Brands, down from 60% in 2016.

So … what’s the point to all of this?

“The purpose of sharing this data is not to inform the brands of these preferences,” the Viant representative tells RBR+TVBR‘s Media Information Bureau. “The actionable insight is that political advertisers can look at these consumer preferences to help them better target their ad campaigns and reach the right voters.”

Viant provided RBR+TVBR with some additional TV show or network preferences.

• • Democrats are:
    • More than 4 times more likely to watch Ballers
    • Almost 4 times more likely to watch Empire
    • 3 times more likely watch WWE SmackDown
    • 92% more likely to watch American Horror Story-6
    • 88% more likely to watch The Vampire Diaries
    • 48% more likely to watch The Flash
    • 44% more likely to watch NBA Basketball
  • Republicans are:
    • 74% more likely to watch Justice With Judge Jeanine
    • 67% more likely to watch Alone
    • 51% more likely to watch Vikings

Viant’s findings match similar findings from Lotame. It used data sourced from Lotame Panorama, a suite of data enrichment solutions that use first-, second- and third-party data to create and analyze addressable audiences across the cookie-challenged web, mobile app, and OTT environments.

By examining billions of anonymized, aggregated online interactions across the web using Lotame Panorama, Lotame found the following about “Politics Genre TV Watchers”:

• While politics is one of their top watched genres, the remainder of their TV viewership includes programs that are easy to watch, including travel shows, home & garden shows, variety shows, and game shows.
• They are less likely to tune in to genres that require more investment like drama, science fiction, and action shows.
• The top industries of people who watch the politics genre are in Information Technology (23%) and Healthcare (14%). The least popular industries are Insurance (2%), Banking (2%) and Media + Entertainment (1%).
• Politics viewers are more likely to be in management positions (42%). 27% are in non-management jobs while 19% are in C-Suite positions and 12% are Board and Ownership.
• People who have watched the politics genre on TV in 2020 are 2.7x more likely to be heavy TV viewers and 6% less likely to be light TV viewers

“As the 2020 election quickly approaches, and COVID restrictions are keeping people at home and in front of the television, political marketers have a good chance of engaging consumers through the biggest screen at home,” said Alexandra Theriault, Chief Customer Officer at Lotame. “Knowing information like what other shows politically engaged viewers watch and what industries they are likely to work in, helps campaigns build a profile of what messaging might resonate best in the last months before ballots are cast.”