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Printing is essential for Scott Brown or any branding revolution

Posted by Jack Valentine on Fri, Feb 26, 2010 @ 11:36 AM

The shortage of Scott Brown campaign signs during the Massachusetts Senate race showed the power of printing

Two months ago, many of you may not have ever heard of Scott Brown. Now the new U.S. Senator from Massachusetts has his own action figure, has been spoofed on Saturday Night Live (for his good looks and sex appeal), and is even making political appearances in Arizona to boost the re-election bid of Sen. John McCain.

Now, we're going to deftly stay out of politics on this blog. As long they are pro-America, we frankly don't care what ideology our customers subscribe to!  But the recent Scott Brown election carries branding and advertising lessons that go way beyond the Democrat-Republican divide.

With the rare exception of the governor's office, Republicans seldom win in Massachusetts. The state Senate now only has FOUR Republicans. It likely is the most lopsided government body in America.  Consequently, any Republican running for statewide or national office in the Bay State is not only an underdog, but a Rocky Balboa kind of of underdog.

Having front row seats for this past election, the most amazing thing about Brown's comeback against favorite Martha Coakley, was the heavy focus on printing to promote his brand, specifically his lawn signs.  Talk radio was flooded with calls from people saying that the campaign had run out of signs. Official campaign bumper stickers were heavily sought-after merchandise, too.

As the Scott Brown campaign experienced the utopian feeling of having supporter demand outstrip their supply, Massachusetts voters made their own homemade signs with markers and posterboard. The media always uses political lawn signs and bumper stickers as a barometer of grassroots support, but in this election even more so.  The pundits kept citing the dramatic imbalance of posted lawn signs and stickers as evidence that the Brown campaign was gaining momentum and might be much stronger than any of the "experts" gave them credit for.

For us, aside from regrets that we weren't one of the printing vendors for the Scott Brown campaign, this historic election was an exciting indicator that old-fashioned printing still wields massive branding power in the Internet Age.  Before the Revolutionary War, patriot Thomas Paine relied on the printing press to challenge British tyranny with his "Common Sense" newspaper. 

And three centuries later, we're still using printing to promote our ideas and challenge our competition.

The great thing is that you need not be a revolutionary to harness the power of printing. Maybe your big battle is to modestly become the most dominant real estate agent or insurance agent in your region.  Branding your document folders and custom presentation folders with your logo and slogan serves the same purpose as a political lawn sign.

Everytime your prospective client glances at their documents, they'll think of you!

Oh, one more thing, it looks like Scott Brown is a huge fan of promotional merchandise.  Everytime you sit on your tush, you'll think of him:

Scott Brown loves to market his message with promotional merchandise

Using printing to brand your message. The US Senate seat, said Scott Brown, was not a Democratic seat or a Republican seat -- it's the people's seat.

 

 

 

 

 


 

Topics: Advertising, low cost print, Document folders, presentation folders, branding, printing, marketing campaign, Thomas Paine, Scott Brown, political signs, lawn signs, bumperstickers