Level Up Your Personal Brand: How Politicians Slay the Internet
I’m here to let you in on one of the biggest secrets for winning voters and climbing the political ladder in the modern era – absolutely dominating the online branding game with simple politician online branding strategies.
See, these days it’s not enough for politicians and candidates to just make some speeches, print out yard signs, and do the occasional interview on the local news channels. Nope, the real battlefield for shaping public opinion and capturing attention spans is being fought on the internet, social media apps, and every digital channel where people are spending their time.
We’re talking Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, streaming services, online ads – you name it. Smart politicians know they need to be strategically planting their flag and cultivating a killer personal brand across every digital realm if they want to reach and persuade voters.
But simply having an account or website isn’t enough. You’ve got to stand out from the competition with clever branding that reinforces the most authentic and aspirational versions of who you are as a candidate or public servant. It’s about giving people a reason to connect with your story and vision on a deeper, emotional level.
So what exactly goes into building an online brand that captures imaginations and translates into actual electoral wins or grassroots movement support? Let’s break down some of the key strategies and tactics that savvy political teams deploy:
Establishing a Powerful Digital HQ
First thing’s first – you need to lock down a rock-solid digital home base that serves as the central hub for promoting your online brand’s narrative and capture audience data. That means investing in an elite-level website that checks all the boxes:
• Visually stunning design that reinforces your personal brand’s look and feel
• Clear navigation for promoting your bio, background, policy positions, and calls-to-action
• Smooth integration with fundraising tools, e-commerce merch stores, and email list signups
• Optimized for search engines and voice assistants so people can easily find you
• Mobile-friendly flexible layout that works flawlessly on any device
• Personalized content sections (blogs, video updates, speeches) that keep things fresh
This digital headquarters is where you control your own narrative front-and-center. It provides authoritative context and framing around who you are as a messenger – before people form their own opinions elsewhere online.
From there, you can seamlessly expand your branded content across the internet.
Crafting a Cohesive Social Media Persona
Once your HQ website is on lock, the next priority is achieving complete saturation across all relevant social media platforms with activated, verified accounts projecting a unified persona and voice.
That means setting up channels on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, TikTok, etc. – then posting a high cadence of videos, graphics, polls, updates, and other engaging, personality-driven content that reinforces your core branding tenets in an ultra-consistent way.
The goal is to have a 360-degree, omni-channel social media presence that makes voters feel like they’re getting an authentic window into who you are as a human being – your background, personality quirks, hobbies, values, and more. Inject as much relatability as possible!
Smart campaigns will then invest heavily into promoting that social persona and content through:
• Targeted paid advertising tailored by platform and audience
• Earned media integrations where influencers amplify or engage with posts
• Posting highly shareable, “snackable” content tuned for each feed’s native formats
• Activating grassroots fan/supporter efforts to spread the brand organically
• Aggressive cross-promotional efforts to drive traffic between different channels
Leave no digital stone unturned! The more you can proliferate and reinforce your personal brand’s narrative everywhere constituents are consuming content, the more it becomes an ubiquitous part of the online Zeitgeist.
Leaning Into Visuals and Memes
Speaking of snackable, shareable content…one area where many politicians tend to struggle is creating visual media that naturally fits today’s meme-fueled internet humor and culture.
After all, most older candidates grew up in an era of boring radio spots, print ads, and PSA-style videos. Not exactly riveting stuff for the Extremely Online generation raised on internet in-jokes and lightning-fast content cycles, you know?
Smart digital teams are employing entire squads of videographers, animators, graphic designers, and social-native creatives for the sole purpose of producing ultra-viral, bite-sized content that plays into the latest cultural trends without being too cringy.
They’re crafting custom GIFs, Reels, TikToks, memes, image macros, and relatable short-form vids that showcase their candidate’s funnier, more irreverent side and broadcast relatability.
We’re talking the type of content that gets spread like wildfire while imprinting the brand’s messaging – whether intentional or subliminal. Even if people don’t realize it, those hilarious memes and skits end up becoming the online version of catchy jingles in our heads.
It’s an emerging art form in our Extremely Online era – and those who figure out how to thrive in the shitposting economy without losing authenticity will enjoy a massive strategic advantage.
Investing in Multimedia Storytelling
Of course, for all the micro-content that rules the social feeds, truly resonant political brands still need longer-form multimedia and immersive storytelling to break through the online noise.
That’s why elite campaigns are allocating big budgets for high-production-value digital video series, interactive content experiences, live-streamed events, docuseries, podcast/audio shows, augmented reality activations, and more. They’re leveraging the full power of the internet!
The idea is to package up the candidate’s background, values, and policy platforms into highly engaging, dynamic, multi-part content experiences that entertain while educating.
Maybe it’s a long-form video diving deep into a complex wonky topic through eye-popping data visualization and animations. Perhaps it’s an influencer-led “Candidate Chronicles” series that puts a hilarious, irreverent spin on life on the trail. Or a virtual event inviting supporters into the metaverse for a world-building experience.
Whatever format(s) resonate most for your target audiences, the goal is to make people feel like they’re truly getting an authentic look behind the curtain – while also subtly advancing your core narrative and spurring earned media/social sharing.
Rapid Response Content Operations
Of course, in the online era, it’s not enough to simply control your own channels and conduct one-way broadcasting of meticulously pre-planned branding content. You also need the capability to respond to breaking news events and rapidly seize control of internet narratives through hyper-speed content creation.
Smart candidates and causes build entire “rapid response” content operations for handling these make-or-break moments, including:
• 24/7 social media listening Command Centers and intelligence monitoring
• Reactive content playbooks and pre-drafted messaging for every scenario
• Partnerships with trusted digital publishers and influencers
• In-house creative teams that can spin up videos, graphics, websites in hours
• Ability to weaponize paid media budgets for narrative amplification ASAP
So when something huge goes down in the news cycle, you can flood digital zones of control with coordinated rapid response content that promotes your authentic perspective and branding of politician online branding strategies.
Build an Internet Army
Finally, one of the most potent forces for amplifying and spreading a well-constructed online brand is the power of motivated, passionate online communities.
Politicians who invest in cultivating loyal digital fan bases – from extremely online power users, to super-volunteers who create user-generated content, to fervent Reddit communities and Discord channels – gain a significant strategic advantage as one form of politician online branding strategies.
These organic internet armies become force multipliers who organically spread branded content, counter misinformation and opposing narratives, and overwhelm digital spaces with grassroots buzz. It’s an energized, round-the-clock brand awareness engine that becomes wildly difficult for opponents to throttle.
So there you have it! While grabbing headlines or appearing on cable TV may have been the priority for politicians of previous generations, nowadays it’s all about constructing aspirational, multimedia-driven personal brands that spread like wildfire across the internet and seep into the cultural zeitgeist.
Master the skills of digital branding and content creation in this hyper-modern era, and you’ll be able to mobilize supporters in ways that were unimaginable just a decade ago to build politician online branding strategies. Get it right, go viral, convert fans into voters – and you just might rise to the very top of the political ranks!