The Most Interesting Virginia Election of 2020

It boiled down to Brand Marketing and Sales.

Here’s one of my #1 Rules of Politics.

Campaigns are won in the beginning, not the end.

Since we are now deep into the Era of Political Brands, we should understand how brands are created and sold.

As with all brands, political brands boil down to Marketing and Sales.

Here’s an article from Forbes on the difference.

Marketing is the culmination of all activities that set the stage for sales (e.g., the transaction itself) to take place.

Marketing is all about the Four Ps: product, price, place and promotion.

The marketing people set the stage for the salespeople to walk out on stage and get a standing ovation from the audience. It's an audience that has already been warmed up through brand recognition, relevant content and targeted messaging.

With that back drop, let’s look at the most fascinating electoral outcome of the 2020 political season here in Virginia - the mayor’s race in Virginia Beach.

Democrats did well here with U.S. Senator Mark Warner, President Joe Biden, and Congresswoman Elaine Luria earning the most votes respectively.

But not when it came to the race for mayor in which incumbent Republican Bobby Dyer who won by nearly 8 points.

The mayor’s race in Virginia Beach is a non-partisan race in which candidates appear as independents while being endorsed by their respective parties.

U.S. Senator Mark Warner won Virginia with 56% of the vote but dropped down to 54% in Virginia Beach with 120.7k raw votes.

President Joe Biden won Virginia with 54% of the vote but dropped down to 51.6% in Virginia Beach with 117.4k raw votes. He netted 97.2% of the Warner vote.

Congresswoman Elaine Luria won her 2nd CD seat with 51.8% of the vote while carrying Virginia Beach with 51.55% Her raw votes in VB were 116.6k or 96.6% net of the Warner total.

Straight Democratic ticket, right? Only losing 3.4% for the first three offices.

Then we look at the Mayor’s race where Democratic candidate, Jody Wagner, only managed to net 80% of the Warner haul with 96.6k raw votes.

Republican Bobby Dyer pulled out a 51.6 to 43.9 or a nearly 8 point win in the same city that Mark Warner won by nearly 8 point with 113.5k raw votes.

That was a total of 15.6 swing in a hyper partisan election.

How did that happen? All politics is local and personal but first one has to know what is local and personal.

Yeah, I’m not doing to dime out Dyer’s consultant, Brian Kirwin, as to the specifics. While I share my own cooking recipes, I don’t share those of others. Or as Guido the Killer Pimp (nice brand) said in Risky Business:

In a sluggish economy, never ever f*ck with another man’s livelihood.

Besides, Kirwin is from Philly…so, why risk it?

In the end, the final decision for voters is an A/B test because the choice is always binary. Sadly.

Donald Trump made every decision in the 2016 election cycle a choice either A) Him or B) the person he chose to be B.

Me or Low Energy Jeb? Choose.

Next.

Me or Little Marco? Choose.

Next.

Me or Corrupt Hillary?

Trump was able to pick off one by one his opponents in a classic A/B marketing test by creating the Brand of his opponents. That shows the danger of where we are in 2021 right now - having a low name ID at the outset of elections. The brands are largely unknown.

In 2020, Joe Biden’s campaign wisely made the contest a referendum on Trump while Trump tried desperately to make it a choice - an A/B test. Me or Sleepy Joe?

C) Pandemic response

That’s why Biden was virtually unseen during the campaign relative to the constant presence of Trump.

Biden’s team knew that Trump was their best salesman, but their weak brand showed down ballot as the GOP brand actually picked up 11 seats (maybe 12 soon) in largely suburban districts. That new brand? Not Middle Aged White Guys (MAWGS) They went with female and minority candidates.

Dyer is a white male 71 year old incumbent with 14 years of experience. This wasn’t exactly an unknown candidate in another change election. Maybe 71 is the new middle age?

This race swung on a classic A/B test again. This or that. Me or my opponent. Choose.

And in the end the voters chose A) Dyer.

The choice, however, was created in the beginning - where Marketing + Science = Sales.

So here we are again at the beginning of the next political campaign in America - the Virginia Bellwethers. (See what I did there? I branded the Virginia off off cycle. You’re welcome.)

Right now the most important decisions in the 2021 campaigns are being made - branding, personnel, narrative, data, etc…

For all candidates and campaigns, the Choose but Choose Wisely scene from Last Crusade, again, makes the point - beware of the false grail laid before you by others.

Pop Quiz!!!

Who said this and when?

“There was a widespread understanding that this election was not on the level. We still don’t know what really happened.”

Without googling leave answer in Comments.