Halloween is past, but there is still a shadowy specter haunting the American political landscape. Look over there behind that polling station! It's Krazy Karl Rove and his insidious Republican GOTV machine! We're doomed!
Many recent stories in the media have inflated the Republican's turn out efforts into a Godzilla-sized monster, ready to smash through any Democratic wave and carry Republicans back to their Washington lair. And of all the terminology tossed around, none is given more mystical, magical significance than micro-targeting.
Sounds scary. But just what the heck is micro-targeting anyway?
That was then
When we think about a traditional get out the vote effort, there's a tendency to think in military terms. We want to get "boots on the ground." Put people on "the front line." And get face to face with the voters.
Let's take a hypothetical Republican candidate, Mr. Smyth (I'm not letting even a theoretical Republican go by Mr. Smith). Mr. Smyth is a two-term congressman and former prosecutor who has decided to run for an open Senate seat in the state of Missouri. He's anti-choice, pro-corporations, and pretty much in the pockets of some out of state business interests. A few election cycles ago, Mr. Smyth's campaign would have looked like this:
St. Louis and Kansas City are both heavily Democratic areas, so the Smyth campaign would pay them little attention. Instead, they put most of their time and resources into the rural, out-state districts that leaned Republican. That fits with traditional vote-getting strategies which are almost never about "grow the party," and concentrate on "turn out the base."
The Smyth campaign would certainly get ads in the urban areas, but they'd spend heavily in smaller markets like Springfield and Cape Girardeau where they were touching a higher percentage of Republican voters. They'd cook up a good half-dozen radio spots, and a like number for television, with about 75% concentrating on running down the opponent. Toss in one "things I want to do for you" and another anti-choice ad.
When it came to mailings, there would be some general mailings. Usually one of these would be a feel-good ad on Mr. Smyth's history as a tough prosecutor and solid family man. Another might be the laundry list of Mr. Smyth's positions. A third, delivered closer to election day, would savage his Democratic opponent. All these mailings would go out state wide. On a more restricted scale, rural districts would see a couple of additional mailings, one in which Mr. Smyth ranted about his opponents support for raising taxes and another in which rural voters were told Democrats want to "take all their guns."
The ground game would be organized by precincts. To maximize the number of voters who could be visited by canvassers, these efforts would be concentrated in areas with the highest percentage of Republicans. Republicans who lived in heavily Democratic districts might find they had to travel to the next county if they wanted meet Mr. Smyth at a rally. Likewise, they might not be visited by a canvasser.
Early on, the campaign would use the voting rolls to check out independent voters and try find those leaning their way. On Election Day, they'd concentrate on making phone or foot contact again with those Smyth-friendly independents and with their Republican base. Phone banks would be working, spreading the scripted message of "don't let that anti-life tax-raising pervert take our seat." Precinct by precinct, they'd chew through the data, looking to color more of the little blocks on the map red than blue.
This is now
So, how have things changed? Not that much, and completely. It's still about putting boots on the ground. The weapons are still personal visits, phone calls (both human and the robo variety), mass mailings, and ads in the media. The difference is in the effort that's put into getting the right message in front of a particular voter's eyes.
Long before Election Day, the Smyth campaign, working with the party, conducts extensive polling. They ask the participating voters -- who include not only Republicans but independents and even some Democrats -- dozens of questions about things political, and things less political. Then they access the great mass of consumer data that's all too readily available about every member of today's society. They mix in credit scores, your purchasing habits, your history, your... everything they can lay their hands on. And that's a lot.
The press tends to latch onto things like how the resulting databases reveal that Republicans are more likely to drink bourbon or drive a snowmobile. But that's not what this is about. No one is scanning databases out there, trying to find missing Republicans by their bills for Ol' Granddad. It's not really about locating Republicans at all.
To see what micro-targeting is about, let's see how it affects some voters.
Billy Bob is a registered Republican. He's got something of a spotty voting record, but he listens into to Limbaugh, and he sure does hate him some well known Democrats. Not only that, but Billy Bob did a hitch in the Army back in the 80's, and his father was a veteran of Korea. Three weeks before the election, BB gets a general call from the party, testing the waters to see how fired up he is about the campaign. Two weeks out, mail lands in his box showing the Democratic candidate laughing it up with John Kerry and Nancy Pelosi. The next week, he gets a mailer showing veterans supporting Smyth. The day before the election, he gets another call from the campaign, and darned if the person on the phone doesn't mention how Smyth's opponent is supported by Howard Dean and Ted Kennedy. Billy Bob assures the caller that he's heading for the polls as soon as they open.
John Q. regards himself is an independent. He's called himself libertarian a few times, but he's never really voted for libertarian candidates. Fact is, he doesn't vote all that often. He's a small business owner, a father, and a hunter, but he's also pro-choice. As election day approaches, Mr. Q gets a mailing from the Smyth campaign, but this isn't a general "here are my positions" mailer. This is a single subject mailer on gun control. Smyth is shown in camo gear, busting some ducks. A couple of days after that, there's a robo-call. Did Mr. Q know that Smyth's opponent favors a steep increase in the minimum wage? An increase that could cost small business owners millions? And that dirty Democrat also favors more regulations that could mean stacks of paperwork and fines. Just a day before the election, a member of the local NRA is on the horn, telling John that the Democrats will be introducing a bill to register every weapon in the country, including shotguns. John doesn't agree with everything Smyth stands for, but it sure sounds like the guy agrees with him on things that matter. He decides this mid-term election is important enough to make it to the polls.
Jane Doe is a single mother. She's a registered Democrat. On the one hand, she might look like the least likely voter for the Smyth campaign. But Jane lives in an area where she doesn't trust the local schools, so she's got her kids enrolled at a nearby Catholic school. A few weeks before the election, Jane gets a mailer touting Smyth's support for school vouchers. A week after that, it's a call about abortion. It just happens that Jane herself grew up Catholic and recently gave some money to an anti-choice group.
With micro-targeting, it's not just a matter of going after voters in districts that might have previously gotten light attention. Each voter hears a message that addresses their issues.
John Q. subscribed to Sports Afield and once was a member of the NRA. Those anti-gun control messages arrive in his mailbox. But they don't go to Jane. They don't even go to Billy Bob.
This isn't to say that John, or anyone else, is getting a personally-tailored message. But rather than grouping voters geographically, micro-targeting puts them into sets and sub-sets by issues, and then makes sure they hit those issues. Hard. Where the polling and survey data collected early on comes in is to help fill in the blanks on those voters with some info missing. Hmm, we don't know Jim is worried about gay marriage, but the polls show that 75% of people who attend his denomination of church are, so it's worth taking a shot to see if this will get him stirred up.
This all makes sense, right? Micro-targeting is just delivering your message in a way that's more effective than slapping the same general statements in front of every voter. So what's wrong with this idea? Plenty.
Micro-targeting is divisive. You and your neighbor are getting different messages in your mailbox, difference messages on your phone, and different messages in your email. How can there be a "national conversation" a topic, when only a few voters even get the information, and what information is delivered is slanted a different way depending on who is getting it? Micro-targeting plays up wedge issues, and exacerbates the differences between voters.
Micro-targeting is nastier. Why are micro-targeted messages meaner than more general mailings? Because they can be. If Smyth is putting out his anti-choice message to the whole state, including to Republicans who are pro-choice, he has to phrase the message in a way that isn't too offensive to those who disagree. But if the anti-choice message is only going to people already in that camp, then the gloves are off. Smyth's opponent wants to smuggle your teenage daughter across state lines and carve that beautiful baby out of her guts while Democratic leaders watch. Don't you doubt it. Pro-choice Republicans and independents don't get upset, because they never see this message.
Micro-targeting is about always preaching to the choir. You always tell the voters what they want to hear. What will get them nodding along with you. What will get them angry enough to climb out of their chairs and drive down to the polling station.
Is it effective? Of course it is. Remember, Karl Rove started as a junk mail king, a purveyor of paper spam. He knows there's always someone willing to bite on the Nigerian scam, and if you can just tinker with the wording to really hit someone's hot buttons, you can get those numbers way up.
But the sad truth for Republicans is that micro-targeting is an aid, not a solution. It can build a knee-high levy against the spring tide, but it can't turn back a full-bore tsunami. It won't win them this election. However, it will help to ensure that this election is meaner, dirtier, and more divisive.
And there's going to be even more of these tactics next time around.