POST 30: DECISION MODELS SHAPE CAMPAIGN STRATEGY

The context for the global warming debate – and for all the other  activities comprising Nancy Knipscher’s rollout campaign – were  two decision support (DSS) models: the AIDAS purchase decision model  and a PERT/CPM project management model indicating  “critical path” and other activities sequenced  to keep the campaign on schedule.

The  AIDAS  model posits five stages of the behavioral process whereby people – in this case voters,  volunteers and other support groups  –  “buy”  an innovation like BBGG. First, they become aware of the innovation, then show some interest in it, then desire to see it carried out. Next, they  take action to make this happen – such as ringing doorbells or donating dollars. Satisfaction results when volunteers are shown how their efforts are paying off, perhaps by pushing up polling approval numbers or  snagging a heavy-hitter endorser (as when Obama snatched Ted Kennedy  out from under Hillary Clinton).

These stages aren’t necessarily  sequential;  given  time and financial constraints, it was considered key to generate  as many as possible at once. During the awareness AIDAS stage, for example, interest, desire and action were also communication goals,  evoked by   dramatic headlines (“Don’t condemn your grandchildren to ecological hell ,” “Let’s win the fight for survival !,” and, of course, “Bring Back the Greatest Generation! ” ). These headlines evoked interest in  descriptions of how BBGG programs,  bringing nations together to  create  a  global green revolution,  would  successfully reverse imminent doomsday  threats of global warming  and a long, dark descent into global depression. Also dramatized were benefits of BBGG programs, including greatly reduced deficits, regained  U.S. world leadership,  improved living standards and  peaceful relations among nations

During the second  AIDAS  stage ( when the global warming debate was staged),  interest and desire would be reinforced as  the nature  and scope of threats facing civilization were stressed along with specifics of BBGG programs to address these threats,  groundwork in place to implement these programs, and the incomparable credentials of Knipscher and her brain trust to carry out these programs. This stage would also relate  BBGG programs to the Bush I Desert Storm campaign and World War II “arsenal of democracy” and Marshall Plan campaigns.

During the third , desire, stage,  emphasis was on  comparisons  of BBGG features and benefits to Democratic and Republican programs, arguing that neither party was  prepared  to deal with the cataclysmic consequences to civilization and the American Way of Life of  either global warming or global depression.

The fourth stage of Knipscher’s campaign – action! — heated up before  primary and caucus elections  beginning with the  January, 2012  New Hampshire primary leading  to Super Tuesday primary and caucus elections in February and the presidential election in November 2012.  Emphasized was focused, frenetic activity by  empowered,  enlightened voting and non-voting constituencies, including get out the vote drives,  recruiting, organizing and influencing people to support BBGG green energy programs; sending out e-mails; organizing fund raisers and house parties;  building Knipscher’s war chest, and  voting the Knipscher-Gore ticket.

Throughout Knipscher’s campaign, satisfaction, the fifth AIDAS stage, was engendered among constituencies  by continual feedback on campaign accomplishments, such as  favorable poll results, growing donation totals,  new endorsements, and individual volunteer achievements.

 PERT/CPM model keeps plans on schedule

The other DSS model comprising the operational context for all campaign  activities executed during the  five stages of the AIDAS model was a PERT (Program Evaluation and Review)/ CPM (Critical Path Method)  model that featured  critical path timelines indicating activities that must be accomplished before other activities could be. For example, generating donations  was  a key  critical path activity,  with dollar totals  specified at points in time sufficient to finance increasing investments in hugely expensive traditional media campaigns – notably TV –during the final months of Knipscher’s campaign.

Advertisement