The Wharton School’s faculty research podcast, “Ripple Effect,” explores what inspires experts’ studies and how their findings resonate with the world today. The moste recent episode series, “Business of Elections” explores the economic issues most relevant to voters in the U.S. presidential election.
In Part 1 of “Are Brands Playing It Safe During Elections,” Americus Reed, the Whitney M. Young Jr., Professor of Marketing at the Wharton School, discusses the risks and rewards for companies that take a political stand during this polarizing election cycle.
“Marketing is about segmentation, targeting, positioning, messaging. Like anything else, there are very few instances where you see a mass market approach. You see tailoring. So, it fits in well with the ideology of marketing itself. But if you’re going to do it, you’ve got to go all in,” says Reed. “You’ve got to live and die by whatever the consequences of doing that is. There is this huge payoff that you can observe with respect to this long-term loyalty and just the idea that, “‘You know what? We’re going to take a stand as a company.’”
Part 2 navigates the turbulent waters of marketing and branding in a highly charged election cycle, and how social media has changed marketing during political times.
“The role of the chief marketing officer is totally different now. We used to never see these people. Now, you better be camera-ready, man,” says Reed. “You better be ready to go out there and talk. What’s your position? Why are you doing certain things? All these things. How are you helping customers? And you have to almost be on the ground with customers, sort of in their domain, living the lives with them, understanding how they’re using your products in ways that can facilitate your ability to regulate the messaging that you want to give to them with respect to some of these issues that you may want to align with.”
And in “Leadership and Elections,” management professor Mike Useem discusses the critical qualities needed from leaders, whether they are running the country or running a business.
“Almost by definition, it is a challenge that a political candidate has because given the great diversity in our voting public, there are great challenges to pull people together who have often very diverse points of view. And the art of leadership, in my humble view, is finding the places where people can find common agreement,” says Useem. “We couldn’t find that back in 1861 when the country fell apart over the Civil War. Little tough this year as well to find that. But I think the great leaders of the moment are those who can find common ground, even if it looks like there is none out there.”
For a full list of podcast episodes, visit the “Ripple Effect” website.
