The Real Problem That Could Cost Democrats the 2020 Election
For Democrats, the 2020 election will be an uphill battle. The challenges they face include Fox News, Sinclair Broadcasting, a Russian troll army, the visibility of the incumbent president, electoral college disadvantages, and many more.
But there’s one problem we’re not even talking about, and it’s self-inflicted:
Democrats suck at branding.
I should know. As a brand strategy consultant I’ve worked with some of the biggest and best brands in the world, and wrote a book on the psychology of brands.
Branding is not logos and slogans. It’s also not marketing and advertising. It’s more subtle, and more powerful, than that.
I define a brand as a collection of associations in the mind. These associations give you a gut feeling about the brand, and that feeling can then sway whether or not you buy, or vote for, that brand. Branding is the process of building up those associations.
Whether we realize it or not, these associations and feelings influence our decisions all the time. Democrats are pretty good at short-term marketing for individual candidates and campaigns. But they are terrible at building a strong long-term brand.
This is no small thing. Branding has the power to shape perceptions, frame ideas, and inspire voters.
Of course, voting for a politician is different than choosing a toothpaste. Both, however, rely on the same evolutionary mechanisms built over millennia in our brains. Whether we’re buying a house, a car, choosing which college to go to, or who to vote for, we’re swayed by subtle, often unconscious, associations built over time.
To see how bad Democrats are at branding, it helps to look at how good Republicans are at it. Here are a few of the positive words and phrases Republicans have successfully appropriated as their own…
- Family values
- Job creators
- Military strength
- Fiscal responsibility
- Pro business
- Pro guns
- Personal responsibility
- Personal freedom
- Small government
- Lower taxes
Republicans look even stronger when you see how they have negatively branded Democrats:
- Tax and spend liberals
- Apologizing for America
- The liberal media
- Giving handouts to “welfare queens”
- Soft on crime
- Hollywood elites (or just “the elites”)
- The nanny state
- Death panels
- Death tax
- Job killing taxes
- Job killing regulations
- Government takeover of healthcare
- Open borders
More recently, they’re attacking Democrats as encouraging “late term abortion,” and even “infanticide.” They’re also working hard to make “socialism” into an evil boogeyman so that whoever the Democratic nominee is (and regardless of their actual policies) that person will be immediately tagged with the negative baggage they’re connecting to that word.
Of course, virtually none of these accurately reflect reality. But these ideas stick in the mind. They end up framing debates and conversations, and Democrats end up using these wordings and frames themselves, which cause them to be strengthened and further embedded in voters’ minds. Democrats get caught in the trap of playing by Republicans’ rules, and on their terms.
These framings work. After all, what self-respecting conservative would vote for, and not actively fight against, a “communist baby killer?”
On the flip side, what are the negative branding words Democrats use to describe Republicans?
1.
2.
3.
That’s right, there aren’t any.
Democrats fail to fight back on these ideas. They cede all branding to them. This lets Republicans define the narrative and language, and by doing so, lets them define the ideas.
On the positive side, what do Democrats stand for? You may be able to list some recent policy ideas like the Green New Deal, or Medicare for All. Or maybe some principles like common sense gun protections, being pro-choice, and maybe civil rights and LGBTQ rights.
But there is no clear overarching brand idea that is based on core values like the Republicans have.
Republicans seem to know intuitively (or were taught by people like Frank Luntz or Roger Ailes) that to win people over it’s not about hitting them with facts. They know you have to appeal to people’s core values, their morals, and their emotions.
Republicans go to issues like safety (immigrants are dangerous, crime on the streets, you need guns to protect yourself) or personal responsibility (no free lunch, I worked hard so you must too, I paid for college so you have to also), etc. These Republican appeals are personal and emotional.
Instead of building a strong brand built on values, morals, and emotions, Democrats tend to focus on policy ideas and lists of facts. We saw this happen with Al Gore, John Kerry, and Hillary Clinton. They all thought “surely if I just tell people the facts about global warming, trickle down economics, or Trump’s lies, people will see the truth and be persuaded.”
But that’s not how the mind works. As mountains of evidence from cognitive science, psychology, and neuroscience show, we humans are highly irrational and driven by emotions.
People vote based on party first, and they align with the party that best fits their values and morals. Pushing facts, or writing a snappy slogan for every new campaign, isn’t going to change someone’s morals and values. It runs too deep for that.
Instead, Democrats need to constantly, consistently, repeat what they believe in and why. They need to make clear the core values they stand for. Over and over and over. This is what will slowly start to change the perceptions of who the Democrats are and what they stand for.
It should not be up to each individual candidate, or to any specific campaign. It has to be a collective effort where all Democrats across the country say the same things, loudly, passionately, repeatedly, and in lock step. Just like Republicans do.
We have the high ground. We are on the right side of the issues, and the majority of Americans agree with Democrats on most major issues:
- Protect Social Security
- Protect Medicare and Medicaid
- Reasonable gun control
- Protect the environment
- Support Planned Parenthood
- Women’s rights
- Minority rights
- Workers’ rights
- Equal pay for equal work
- Safe abortion availability
- A fairer tax system that reduces inequality
- Higher minimum wage
- Health care for all
- Quality education for all
- Support for Veterans
- A pro-growth business environment that produces satisfying, good-paying jobs
So if all that is true (and it is) how can we possibly lose?
We lose because 1) Republicans are much better at branding these issues and their party and 2) Democrats make every candidate start from zero instead of building a clear brand across the party that all Democrats can leverage.
Today, “liberal” has become a bad word. I see progressive/liberal friends shying away from saying they are Democrats. We need to take these words back, and make them ours. We have to show the values and morals that define our thinking. We have to imbue them with the meaning and emotions we intend, and not let Republicans define them for us.
The time is now. With the barrage of scientific reports on climate change calling for ever more drastic measures, time is running out. We have to vote out climate deniers, and vote in Democrats.
Let’s at least make it a fair fight.
This is the first in a series of articles on how Democrats can improve their brand and messaging. Here’s the second article on what Democrats should stand for.
Please share this with anyone you know involved with, or interested in, Democratic politics. We need Democrats to sit up, listen, and make changes to how they communicate. We have to spread the word, and time is running out.
Daryl Weber is a branding consultant and author of Brand Seduction: How Neuroscience Can Help Marketers Build Memorable Brands.
