Tags: Campaign, Digital Activation, Political campaign, Production, Strategic Communication
Political Campaign and Narrative by Folch
Production by White Horse
Written by Marta Campabadal
Tags: Campaign, Digital Activation, Political campaign, Production, Strategic Communication
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We are proud to have had the privilege to work hand in hand with Ada Colau, Mayor of Barcelona, and her team to develop a collective campaign, building her personal narrative based on her vision, while shadowing her on a daily basis. The current political situation and typical communication model required a disruptive campaign that would, on the one hand move the emphasis from Twitter to Instagram, and on the other add an extra layer to the message, by turning textual content into something more engaging and emotional. The result was producing high quality content, activated on social media, on a daily basis by means of a comprehensive production strategy with the support of our production company, White Horse.
“People nowadays are on Instagram. Twitter is like a cave. Lots of noise but there’s nobody there and no one is listening from the outside either… So, our first strategic move was changing the main platform from Twitter and Facebook to Instagram and Youtube, shaping all the content we produced for those platforms.”
Rafa Martínez, Founding Partner, Head of Brand Strategy & COO, Folch
The definition of the campaign in terms of content curation and digital activation cannot be understood without the idea of collectivity and the personal vision of Ada Colau and her team. We worked collaboratively, integrating ourselves with Ada’s team across all aspects of the strategy and application. This was crucial for the success of Barcelona en Comú, for its second legislature in the city council of Barcelona.
“Transforming the established communication model and becoming your own media through social networks is the best tool any politician can have nowadays. This, combined with having a communication support team that shadows you and that you can talk to and guide, is key to effective and direct communication in politics”.
Marta Campabadal, Junior Strategic Communications Manager, Folch
Live streaming was used as a resource to reach more audiences in a direct, fresh and impactful way, as well as adding another layer to her communication. This resource turned out to be one of the most successful assets of the campaign, reaching up to 1.000 people simultaneously on any given occasion.
Digital activation
Ada Colau and her team were shadowed during the five months leading up to the election – defining a robust and meaningful strategy to completely transform her personal narrative. Working with the team at Barcelona en Comú, content for Colau’s social networks was produced, as well as activation and tailoring of each message. More than 220 audiences were defined, creating content for Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and Youtube to specifically target undecided and border voters. The results were a great success – together, 3.739.952 people on Instagram and Facebook, and 472.316 people on Youtube were reached up.
“The biggest challenges in terms of digital activation were finding the equivalence between the interests of the electorate in such an effervescent context as the elections, and the possibilities of segmentation of the platforms. The final objective was generating the audiences and constantly adapting to the communicative moment of the campaign, adjusting the budget needs, the contents and the target to obtain the best campaign results in terms of reach and interaction.”
Pau Costa, Head of Digital Activation, Folch
An unexpected addition
During the municipal campaign, the team had to unexpectedly readapt to the advancement of the general elections and support with that. A spot for Jaume Asens, the new candidate for Catalunya en Comú, was conceptualised, filmed and edited shaping his image as a strong and reliable candidate with a dynamic 30 second video for broadcast TV.
“The chance to be involved in a political campaign has been unique. A volatile context, an intensity like no other, a political project in the eye of the storm resulting in many months of hard work. It was unlike any other experience we’ve ever had.“
Albert Folch, Creative Director & Founder, Folch
Ada Colau already had an active presence on Twitter, so the focus was on daily video content for Instagram and YouTube. One of the actions that had a big impact, both on followers and activity, was the closing of one of her two Instagram accounts in order to concentrate her activity through one source. This also created a feeling that both her and her team were managing the account. The response so far has been hugely successful – doubling her followers on Instagram. Institutional approach was avoided and instead a more engaging and human presence across her digital environments was built up. By producing relevant backstage content and live streaming among other formats, most of the rallies and newsworthy events that she took part in were covered, reaching a deeper and closer understanding of her vision, values and personality. The pattern that was established during the campaign is now being applied with the same logic to all her communications.
“Working on the constant changing environment that a political campaign requires has been a challenge, in terms of briefing, as well as in terms of production. A robust production structure was created and this allowed us to produce, record, edit, apply changes and publish content in a short period of time and with an intense regularity.”
Pol González, Director at White Horse
