And so we hear the news that the re-organisation of the Labour Party communication team will result in the appointment of a ex-Times correspondent as the head of communications, and a former political editor from the Daily Mirror to handle the media relations brief.
These types of appointments are expected, but that also tells us more about the nature of political communication which is so focussed on media relations.
Westminster and the Media
But the closed world of Westminster politics plays its part in this focus on the political pages. It can seem quite surreal, trivial things can seem very important and it becomes hard to know what is happening in the real world.
The newspaper headlines become a scorecard for the political parties. They will assess their success by the number of positive stories that appear in the papers. A week is a long time in politics not least because you are battling every day to control the media agenda.
From a communication perspective it is disappointing. How many people are actually reading the political sections of the newspapers? How much segmentation can you do using the newspapers as your starting point? Do you make assumptions about the readership and their political views? If you do, then you may find yourself taking the wrong route.
How much can you truly communicate through the prism of political journalism? Because we ignoring some of the fundamentals of political reporting.
- This is trench warfare. Like a battle in the Great War, the daily reporting is a series of advances followed by a push back. A success in spinning a political story may be the gain of twenty yards, but a response over the weekend by your opposite number may see you having to retreat fifteen yards. The news cycle is always turning.
- It is not a grand debate. There is sometimes a belief in politics that this is a competition to win the argument. But in a world of partisan newspapers and journalists that is just not true. There are spin doctors on all sides of the story - the newspaper correspondent is just as likely to distort the story to meet their political agenda. You are never going to make a killer argument that will win everyone over to your side. That is not reality of a media that adopts political positions because it is expected of them by an owner or by their established readership.
New tools for communication?
The communication world is changing, and that will impact on politics as it does on every other element. The idea of narrow-casting is just as relevant to political communication. Once again there are number of trends emerging:
- Politicians are becoming their own publishers. The suggestion that every company is now a media company is just as relevant to politicians. A Member of Parliament can develop their broadcast capability quite easily through simple tools - using wordpress to deliver content management, twitter to signpost their messages, and a myriad of packages to deliver the images.
- Politics can become truly local. It is not just about the publication of information. Every office, anyone with a personal computer, has the opportunity to monitor, capture and manipulate information like never before. Every contact with a politicians can provide useful insights, and be used in future communication.
And this is where the communication practitioner starts to come to the fore. With a bit of creativity, they can deliver additional information that will allow the politician to understand their audience, to better understand the policy issues that are important to them.
Of course it already happens to a certain extent. Voters are grouped together by demographics during the election campaigns. This will be done to tailor some of the election material. Young families, in a neighbourhood of young families, will receive a tailored leaflet on the importance of support young families because of their postcode.
Politicians will also develop campaigns to identify potential supporters as well as raise their profile - for example a save the school or a campaign to introduce new speed restrictions. But the tools are now available to take this to another level.
The ability is there to engage with more people through the channels that they are comfortable with. The website can be supplemented by Facebook and Twitter. Online polls can be used to gauge opinion, whilst e-petitions can gather in valuable information about the hot button policies.
On average I think the Scottish constituencies have about 65,000 electors. If you actually start by paying attention to those with a history of voting, then you are reducing that target group down quite considerably to about 40,000 people.
There are ways in which we can start to slice that up into very manageable numbers. And gradually you can also bring in those that would vote, if you can give them a good enough reason.
The last election showed us how social media can play a part in campaigns. Yes of course it was the TV debates that dominated the General Election, old technology still has its place. But we saw thousands online, tweeting and taking part in the debate.
So where does my post lead us?
Whereas in the past your information about politicians might flow from the national media, from those politics pages. Contact in the future should become more personal. There is an opportunity for communication from politicians to be better targeted, and the messages more appropriate.
With the expansion of the media, including the social media, there may also be additional points of contact. There will be more ways for the voter and politician to engage.
And that is before we even touch upon the new communities that are developing online. Those with political interests, or hobbies and past-times are taking their interests online. They are developing new communities, and it will be important to politicians to understand how they engage.
It will be interesting to see how the communication teams of the political parties develop over time. Understanding the traditional media will always be important but it will be just as important to bring the broader strategic skills in order to segment the audience, develop persuasive messages and choose the best channels of communication.
The ability to write a newspaper report of a House of Commons Debate may not be the only qualification required to advise a political party on engaging the nation.
