Campaigns Get Personal

Rotenberg worries that voters, who have no idea of what campaigns know about them, can be unfairly manipulated. Consider this example from TargetPoint's work for Romney this winter. According to Lundry, Romney voters were strongly represented among "country-club Republicans"—well-off folks who care deeply about financial issues that favor their portfolios. But TargetPoint identified another group, one not quite sold on Romney, but susceptible to a pitch on his economic policies. These were people who didn't make as much money as the country-clubbers, but displayed consumer habits similar to the snob set—drove SUVs, went to the theater, bought natural foods. What's more, says Lundry, "they identified with the politics of those they are emulating." Calls to those strivers with messages about Romney's tax policies got results.

On the one hand, that's simply efficient communication, matching voters with a candidate who shares a point of view. But seen another way, the Romney camp has sorted out individuals whose striving makes them vulnerable to a pitch that, at least with their current financial status, is at odds with their economic interests. Would they have been as susceptible if the caller informed them why they were the ones receiving the call? According to our data, you're living beyond your means. Wouldn't you like to vote that way, too?

That's troubling, but the real problem with microtargeting isn't its practice, but the way it embodies how overpolled and overcalculated our elections have become. How can a candidate be great if his or her targets are micro?

© 2008