Rapid City Mayor Alan Hanks takes the same positive tack in his final mailing as his main challenger in today's election, Sam Kooiker. Unlike Kooiker, Hanks has graphic designers who get that positive means positive:
Construction downtown, endorsements...
...and there's that West River sunrise I asked for!
Better advertising alone doesn't justify voting for someone. But the final flyers from Hanks and Kooiker show at the very least that Hanks has smarter people with a more critical eye working for him. There's an argument there that, in performing basic mayoral duties like picking good staff, evaluating city worker performance, and sending positive messages about Rapid City (though we might rephrase the latter as "being a good BS artist"), Hanks has an edge.
I may be in a minority, but aren't both of the ads that feature photographs of the candidates too wordy and too full of text? I don't get a quick, clear story from either of them. The bold text on the Hanks ad seems overdone as well.
I think the bold text is there on Hanks piece so you don't have to read the whole thing if you're in a hurry, LK, and the rest if you want the whole story. Strategy being, if you want more info, it's there. If not, just hit the highlights.
By contrast, Kooiker has run his body copy on the back side of his card over a confusing background of varying degrees of contrast, making it difficult to read what's there, even if you want to.
You know me, LK: I'm way too text-heavy myself. I like Bill's explanation of the strategy. Plus, there's certainly a difference between the front with fewer words and the back with more, another way to get the message across quickly to the first-galncers but still provide more info for those who want to make the effort (the herculean effort of flipping a card ;-) ). One thing I'd change: "Hanks" isn't big enough on either side. The biggest font on the front should go for HANKS.
Why would anyone vote for Kooiker when they can vote for someone like that? It looks positive to me.
Oh, oh, Cory's one of those "make the logo bigger" kinda guys. ;^)
http://www.makemylogobiggercream.com/
Okay, one more. You'll love this one, Cory.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYEf8XZKlUU&feature=related
Dang! Order me some of that Fluorescencizer! :-)
Hilarious and instructive, Bill. I'll defer to the professional in the room. But what can we do to make the eye bounce to the candidate's name sooner on that front page? And do we want to do that?
You do that when the candidate has low name recognition, Cory.
That is not an issue with either Sam or Alan in Rapid City. Now, the other two guys.... yeah, they need some big logos.
Keep in mind that this piece is the last of a series of about 6 or so mailers that have been arriving in people's mail boxes over the last few weeks, plus TV, plus newspaper, etc. The Name ID is totally covered. Around election day, what people need is INFORMATION on the issues.