Vote Coca-Cola In ‘08
With the primaries and caucuses starting up this year it is a good time to bring your attention to Presidential Brands. According to the site “Just like these famous companies, presidential candidates try to shape your thoughts, perceptions, feelings and experiences in order to make a sale - in this case, a vote.” The folks at Presidential Brands did a study to look at how the candidates are perceived and how they are trying to be perceived.
As the study was originally released back in April some candidates have changed their course and are working to change their image, but you do see some interesting things. While looking at Presidential branding and seeing how these candidates are trying to be perceived comparisons can be drawn between them and major companies as well.
The site makes some brand comparisons for each candidate the only one that follows through on almost all the candidates are what type of car they would be based on their branding.
| Candidate | Car |
| Hillary Clinton | Volvo |
| Barack Obama | BMW Z4 |
| John Edwards | Prius |
| Rudy Giuliani | Toyota Rav4 |
| John McCain | Ford |
| Mitt Romney | Dodge Viper |
The Democrats (and Fred Thompson) also get compared to baseball teams and technology while the Republicans are compared to jeans and other random companies. They list out the brand attributes that each candidate was pushing (and some are continuing to push them). There was even a November follow up.
Some pretty interesting stuff and definitely worth taking a peek at.
8. January 2008 at :
Nice idea, but impossibly subjective. I do not see Hillary in a Volvo…now or ever! She’s in a 2-door Ferrari Castrata.
Barack has two little girls, and so I’m thinking four door. I think he’s confident enough in his abilities to not yet need a midlife crisis mobile.
John McCain doesn’t drive, probably, given his Hanoi injuries, but if he did drive, he’d be in Prius with a Ford tag on it.
Mitt Romney would drive the BMW, because he’s got a teensie weensie itsy bitsy, uh, sense of self, and needs to cover with a lot of Powerpoints, hair gel, business plans and suits. He’s the kind of guy who doesn’t know how to dress casually on the weekends.
Rudy would be in a tank. Like Dukakis, but Rudy looks good in a tank. But tanks are…what, you say? Slow moving, ineffective in modern street warfare, great for military suppliers, perpetuating of the Eisenhower military industrial complex…
11. January 2008 at :
[...] help her campaign (the jury’s still out on whether it really did), though perhaps it was her branding that did it. Sony BMG, it is agreed, is really [...]
16. April 2008 at :
[...] Reminds me of our previous analysis of candidate branding, Vote Coca Cola In ‘08. [...]