McCain Beats Obama in Online Ad Tactics?
ADOTAS – Has the notoriously technically clueless McCain trumped Obama … online? Obama, the Facebook, text and online fund-raising maven is getting a run for his money from McCain, who’s adopted search marketing as a way to reach out to undecided voters and lure them to his camp.
A report in The Wall Street Journal analyzes what it characterizes as McCain’s ambush ad tactic:
“As of Wednesday, a Google search for ‘Joe Biden’ or even just ‘Biden’” resulted in a prominently displayed ad labeled ‘Joe Biden on Obama’ that links to Sen. McCain’s site. There, a video begins playing that shows Sen. Biden criticizing Sen. Obama during the Democratic primaries. The move mimics the ‘ambush’ strategy that advertisers often employ: buying a competitor’s term so that an ad for the buyer’s own product appears when a consumer searches for the other brand.”
Not too shabby for a 71-year-old self-declared computer illiterate.
McCain has also snapped up search ads linked to terms like “U.S. economy” and “housing crisis,” which all send visitors to sites explaining his strategy for tackling such issues, the Journal reports.
Last month, McCain had 15.1 million sponsored link impressions, compared with 1.2 million from Obama’s camp. (Obama beats McCain in the display ad arena with 416.7 million compared to McCain’s 16.5 million).
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Reader Comments.
Yeah, you can almost picture McCain tinkering with AdWords manager or using the keyword suggestions tool. Not too shabby for a 71-year-old self-declared computer illiterate.
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