It’s barely March of the out-year, yet here they come: a drip of TV ads targeting lawmakers on the ballot in November 2014. In 2012 and 2010, the earliest TV issue ads captured by Kantar Media’s CMAG in congressional races aired a year before Election Day.
The 2014 air wars won’t just start earlier—they’ll be smarter and more efficient. We’re coming off a presidential race won by a weak incumbent who schooled future candidates on how to maximize every play of the ad targeting game. The midterms offer statewide and district-level laboratories for advertisers of both sides to apply lessons learned. 2014 will be the year traditional ad buying techniques are jettisoned and a new mainstream approach starts to gel.
The real question is just how far beyond the days of placing on Fridays, staying dark in the summertime, and living and dying by GRPs we’ll move in one cycle. “Will 2014 be a traditionally bought ‘saturation election’ or a more targeted, data-driven election?” asks Tim Kay, director of political strategy for the nation’s local cable systems. The Obama campaign’s
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