For Dr. Lee McGaan

CATA 339

November 22, 2002

Persuasive Campaign Plan

Reelecting Mayor Daley for office

I. Reelection campaign overview.

On Feb. 25, 2003, Mayor Richard Daley will run in the primaries for reelection as Mayor of the City of Chicago. Reelecting Mayor Daley will ensure the City of Chicago can continue to provide job opportunities, as he will continue to bring new businesses to Chicago. Mayor Daley will also continue to improve safety on the streets of Chicago.

A. Thesis: Throughout this campaign, I plan to inform college students residing in Chicago about the upcoming primaries for Mayor of Chicago and motivate them to vote for Richard Daley for reelection in his fifth term as Mayor. It is important for students to vote in the primaries, as Mayor Daley might only have one opponent from his Democratic Party and no opponent from the Republican Party. Daley may be voted into office for the fifth term. Conversely, if he only has one opponent, that individual may win instead of Daley. Reelecting Mayor Daley for a fifth term is beneficial for college students, as he has helped to increase job opportunities through enticing Boeing to come to Chicago and expanding O’Hare International Airport, among other business ventures. He has also worked to expand the services the City of Chicago provides for its residents, thus creating more jobs. Mayor Daley is also committed to improving the City’s neighborhoods and is trying to make Chicago’s streets safer.

B. Invention: Mayor Richard Daley should be reelected for the Office of Mayor because he is committed to improving the City of Chicago. College students can help him continue to improve Chicago when they vote for him in the primaries. Any college student who is 18 years of age, a U.S. citizen, and a resident of a precinct of Chicago for at least 30 days may vote.

C. Purpose: Through this campaign, my purpose is to inform and to eventually persuade college students in Chicago to vote in the City’s primary elections for the office of Mayor in February of 2003. In planning this persuasion campaign, I realize different levels of support will depend upon college students’ knowledge of political issues and their willingness to vote.

1. People who do not vote.

Individuals who do not vote at all will be very difficult to convince to vote for Mayor Daley for reelection. These individuals do not vote for a number of reasons: the students do not meet the legal requirements for voting; they are uninformed about the issues and feel they cannot make a good choice; the students are politically apathetic; students do not know how to register to vote or know where to vote; students may be registered to vote in another precinct; voting might be something students feel cannot fit into their schedule; the candidates may not appeal to students; and students feel their vote does not count and does not matter and cannot make a difference. The desirable outcome for this group is to lessen resistance and to have them vote in the primaries for mayor. The campaign will try to address some of the problems these students have with voting, such as trying to show the impact of students’ votes on the overall election. For example, if every college student could register to vote, there would be 140,000 registered voters. In the last primaries, 750,000 voters voted. The college students could make up about 20 percent of the overall votes and greatly impact the election results.

2. People who feel voting is a good idea, but might not vote.

Students may have positive feelings towards voting and feel it is a good way to voice their opinion about the government. However, students might not vote because they feel they are not informed about the issues at stake in the election; students may be indifferent to the candidates for mayor; they may feel their needs are not represented in the candidates running for office; and lastly, students may not know how to register and how to vote. The campaign must focus on informing students about the Mayor’s platform and motivate these students to vote. The goal for these students is to lessen their resistance and increase their knowledge of voting and the issues at hand.

3. People who exercise their right to vote.

These are students who have voted before and are informed about the voting procedures for the mayoral primaries; this group also includes first-time voters who have already registered and are familiar with the issues and voting procedures. The campaign must focus on motivating the students to vote for Mayor Daley for reelection. The students will be knowledgeable about the political parties and therefore need to be persuaded to vote for Mayor Daley instead of his opponents. This may be difficult to do, as these students are generally well-informed about the candidates and have formed their own opinions. Also, students may have a strong political background and have a tendency to vote for a particular party, thus making it difficult to persuade a very conservative student to vote for Mayor Daley. Students who consider themselves to be liberal will also be difficult to convince to vote for Mayor Daley, as there may be more than one liberal opponent. The campaign will try to encourage the liberal students to vote for Mayor Daley and not the other candidates. The campaign will focus on the “middle-of-the-road” students who are not associated with any political party. These students will be easier to persuade, as they are not firmly entrenched in any political party.

II. Audience.

College students living in Chicago are the general audience who will be exposed to the persuasion campaign. These students live, work, and go to school in the City of Chicago and are directly affected by any decision the Mayor of Chicago makes. The campaign is targeted, however, to college students seeking employment after graduation because they are the group most likely to be interested in the city’s job market; and to college students who attend classes in DePaul University’s Loop campus because the Loop area of Chicago has one of the highest crime rates in the city and these students will be more concerned about safety.

A. General audience.

Students in the general audience are typical of college students throughout the nation. Demographically, they are similar to students who attend colleges and universities in other areas of the country. College students who live in Chicago will be targeted because they live under the jurisdiction of Mayor Daley. Students living in the City of Chicago are, on average, between 17 and 22 years of age while they are working on their undergraduate degrees. Students working on their graduate degrees are, on average, 25 years old. On average, over 25 percent of all students at Chicago universities are from out of state or are from another country. Nearly 16 percent of all college students wish to influence political structure and 25.7 percent feel it is important to be kept up-to-date about political affairs. Approximately 140,000 students attend community colleges or universities in the City of Chicago.

The goals for the general audience are to inform the college students of the upcoming primaries for mayor and to encourage college students to register to vote and to later vote for Mayor Daley. Realistically, it will be difficult to encourage all college students to register to vote and to vote for Mayor Daley. Many students are from out-of-state and may be registered to vote in their hometowns; some college students are not yet 18 and are therefore ineligible to vote; and it will be difficult to persuade people firmly entrenched in their political beliefs to vote for Mayor Daley if his political views do not coincide with their views. However, the campaign seeks to make voting a pertinent part of students’ lives and encourage them to vote.

B. Audience segments.

There are groups besides the general audience who will be targeted for this campaign. Although they are part of the general audience, these segments have specific characteristics that demand special treatment.

1. Students seeking jobs after graduation in the next few months: Students seeking employment in the City of Chicago within the next few months are one of the main targets of this campaign. These students are not demographically different from other college students; however, they are more likely to be concerned about the job market because they will seek employment within the next few months. These students will have a more favorable attitude towards Mayor Daley, as they will remember his influence in getting jobs for the City of Chicago and their need of finding a job after graduation. The campaign will seek to remind these students of Mayor Daley’s influence in strengthening Chicago’s job market.

2. Students attending DePaul University’s Loop campus: Chicago’s Loop area has one of the highest crime rates in the city. DePaul University has one of its campuses located in this area. Students attending classes at this branch will be a group that is very concerned with safety and crime prevention. A campaign designed for this group will emphasize Mayor Daley’s work in making Chicago’s streets safer. Students will be more likely to vote for Mayor Daley because of his work with preventing crime and the students’ high value of safer streets.

3. Students who consider themselves to be very busy: College students who regularly juggle a heavy course load, a part-time job and involvement in many different organizations may feel they are hard-pressed for time. Over 74 percent of all college students have a job and over 37 percent participate in three or more organizations. These students want to make a decision quickly and want quick results. These students value information condensed to a few sentences to enable them to make a decision and to move on to another topic.

4. Career counselors as reference groups: College students have a number of reference groups that help them make decisions. This campaign will focus on career counselors as reference groups because these individuals have the most knowledge of Chicago’s job market. These individuals will help students make a decision about Mayor Daley because the career counselors know about his improvements to Chicago’s job market. These counselors can directly affect if a student chooses to work in Chicago because of this knowledge.

These segments of the general audience were chosen because each group has a specific need and value that can affect the way they vote in the primaries for mayor. These students have a high value of overall well-being, which is further broken down with their interest in finding a job, crime and safety, and attending a particular university. By appealing to these attitudes and values, the campaign intends to increase the number of students who will vote in the primaries to ensure these needs are met through the reelection of Mayor Daley.

III. Reelection promotion.

College students living in the City of Chicago will need to be persuaded to register to vote, and to later vote for Mayor Daley for reelection. This will be a difficult task because of college students’ attitudes towards voting. However, the promotion campaign will seek to influence their attitudes towards voting by reflecting the students’ empowerment over changing the role of government in their daily lives.

A. Identity.

The reelection campaign will be identifiable through its recognizable through its consistent themes, symbols, motives and values. These identifiable markers will be exclusive to the reelection campaign and will give the students a consistent message every time a student sees the promotions.

1. Theme: This campaign’s theme is to remind college students of their right to vote and to empower them to make a decision that will positively affect their life in Chicago. The focus of the campaign will be to remind students that the can have positive effects from the elections for mayor and this can be done by simply voting in the primaries. As over 16 percent of all college students say they wish to influence government, this empowerment will appeal to them, as it reminds them of the power of their vote and how they can change the government with very little effort. By using this theme of empowerment, students will be more likely to vote because they will realize that their vote does count and does have an effect on society. This is the desired outcome for this campaign.

2. Symbol: Every publication and message connected with the reelection campaign will have two consistent symbols:

The symbol on the left is the seal of the City of Chicago. This is used only with official publications from the City. The other symbol is a picture of the City of Chicago’s flag. This reflects Mayor Daley’s connection with the City of Chicago. These are also heuristics, as students will look at these official logos and quickly determine that the information is important and official. The mentality will be: “If it is coming from the office of the Mayor, it must be true and it must be important.” Also, every message will use the tagline: “Mayor Daley for reelection. Together, we can make a better future. Vote in the mayoral primaries on February 25, 2003.” This consistent slogan reminds students of their empowerment to vote and to express their opinions and gives them directions on how to vote and for whom they should vote.

3. Motives: My campaign will use heuristics to encourage students to vote for Mayor Daley. These are rules of thumb people abide by to help them make a decision and to move on to another topic to think about.

4. Values: The main value for the reelection campaign is the power students have to control their future by reelecting Mayor Daley for office. The campaign shows students how easy it is for them to make a difference in their own lives.

B. Credibility.

This campaign needs to establish credibility to ensure students will retain the information in the messages and to act upon the suggestions. To increase credibility, this campaign will use the City’s official seal and flag on all of its messages. These images are only used with official documents, thus making the messages’ recipients feel the documents are credible because they are coming from the Office of the Mayor. Another aspect of credibility will be the use of members of the Chicago Police Department to inform the students of Mayor Daley’s efforts to cut down on crime in the city. A high-ranking official with the CPD will enhance credibility, as they will be seen as knowing the facts about crime. These credibility factors will help students make a decision about the campaign, as these individuals will be seen as trust-worthy and respectable.

C. Case-building.

The reelection campaign will incorporate many different tactics and message strategies to persuade students to vote for Mayor Daley for a fifth term. Each audience segment will require a new and different message because of the different values and attitudes in each group.

1. Campaign participants.

Students already volunteering with the reelection campaign are most likely already in support of Mayor Daley, or at least have lessened their resistance to his politics because of their involvement in the campaign. These students need to be reassured that they are supporting the right person to be elected to office. To do this, student volunteers will wear special campaign tee-shirts with the Mayor Daley’s name on it to create an identity with a granfalloon; the “in” group will be students supporting Mayor Daley, while the “out” group will be students who are supporting his opponents. Students will feel exclusive because they are on the inside track helping out the Mayor, while their classmates are not doing anything (Appendix 1).

2. Reference groups.

This campaign will focus on career counselors in Chicago’s universities as reference groups for college students. This particular group has knowledge about Chicago’s job market and Mayor Daley’s influence on the market. This reference group will directly affect the decisions students make when they decide to look for jobs after graduation. This campaign will target this reference group to give information pertinent to the job market and to Mayor Daley. The college students perceive the career counselors as credible, because the counselors have first-hand knowledge of the hiring procedures and know about demographics and trends in the economy.

a. Initial message: The career counselors will receive fliers about Mayor Daley’s contributions to Chicago’s job market. These fliers are the same fliers students looking for a job will see. Career counselors receive lots of mail every day about a variety of topics, so to stand out, these fliers will arrive with a complimentary pizza around lunchtime. This will use the rule of reciprocity, as the counselors will be more willing to tell students about the campaign because they feel this is how they can pay for their pizza (Appendix 2, 3, 4).

b. Secondary message: Career counselors are busy people and do not have time to go to a lengthy meeting or demonstration about Mayor Daley. To combat this issue, this campaign will send volunteers of the campaign to the career centers and tell the counselors they may receive pins to hand out to students that endorse Mayor Daley. However, to receive the pins, the counselors must explain the many job opportunities Mayor Daley has brought to the City of Chicago. This is a form of self-persuasion, as the counselors must think of reasons why they should vote for Mayor Daley instead of passively reading a flier explaining these same virtues. If the counselors can think of the reasons on their own, they can later tell students about the benefits of voting for him.

c. Follow-through message: To ensure the career counselors are telling students about the Mayor, the counselors will be sent short email notifications about the campaign and Mayor Daley’s work with the job market. These emails will be sent twice a week and will be modeled after the email sent to students looking for a job (Appendix 5). The counselors will also receive a call once a week from the campaign volunteers to ensure they are telling students about Mayor Daley. A short questionnaire about the students who have come into the center will be in the call. For example, a volunteer might ask about the number of students the counselor saw in the last week and the locations students want to work. The volunteer can remind the counselor of Mayor Daley’s work in the City of Chicago and what the counselors can do to ensure their students have jobs in the future.

3. Busy students.

Students who consider themselves to be very busy do not have a lot of time to spend contemplating the merits of every candidate for mayor. They want to receive information that is quick and easy to understand without having to do a lot of contemplation about the message. Heuristics will be used to help the students make a quick decision about the campaign and the candidates, as the messages will rely on “rule of thumb” thinking to help the students arrive at a good decision.

a. Initial message: Students will be exposed to a quick list of the benefits of voting for Mayor Daley. It will be presented in the form of a flier with a list of a variety of positive aspects Mayor Daley has brought to the City of Chicago. The flier will include the City’s seal and flag and make the students feel that it is an important, credible document because it is associated with the city. This heuristic will enable them to accept the document as legitimate (Appendix 6).

b. Secondary message: The balance theory will be used to help the busy students accept the campaign and to consider Mayor Daley as a credible candidate. To accomplish this, fliers with notable Chicagoans endorsing Mayor Daley will be sent to Chicago universities and colleges to tell students why they should vote for Mayor Daley. These students might not want to attend a speech or a rally about Mayor Daley, but they will be more open to reading fliers about endorsing Mayor Daley. Also, if students have a favorable attitude towards the Chicagoans, they will also have a favorable attitude towards the mayor. The endorser will drive down resistance from the students. The theory also works with the necessity of the students to make a quick decision, as the students will think: “I like Roger Ebert and he thinks Mayor Daley is great. Therefore, I will think about reelecting Mayor Daley” (Appendix 7).

c. Follow-through message: These busy students will receive emails in the week prior to the cut-off day for registering to vote to remind them where to go to register. To get students to sign up for an email notification, booths will be set up, similar to the tactic used for students looking for a job. Students will feel that they must pay for their free slice of pizza by signing up for email notification. The emails can be sent by geographic location of where students live, as that is where they will register to vote. For example, every student who lives in the Lincoln Park area will receive information on where to register to vote in that area and perhaps have a link on the email to a website where they can vote online. This will encourage registration, as students will not need to hunt for the information on their own and can simply fill out the form online. Instead, the information is already available to them. This information is necessary, as students will be interested in voting but might not know where or how to register to vote. The last email will be sent a few days prior to the election to remind students to vote and to give them addresses of where they can vote (Appendix 5).

4. Students looking for a job.

Students looking for a job in the City of Chicago are concerned about the job market. These students want to know about the availability of jobs and the strength of the economy in Chicago. This aspect of the campaign will appeal to them because the messages will emphasize Mayor Daley’s involvement with the job market and bringing more jobs to the Chicago.

a. Initial message: A booth will be set up in or near the career center at every university and college in the City of Chicago beginning in the first week of the second semester, ideally during a job fair. Students will be asked to sign up for email notification of Mayor Daley’s campaign in exchange for a free slice of pizza. This is based on the rule of reciprocity, as students will feel they need to pay for their pizza by signing up for the email notification. The email notification can be tailored to be sent to a specific sub-group, such as public relations majors, students attending a specific school, gender, race, or geographic location. This email has the elements of the granfalloon, as students who receive the message will feel they are on the inside track of the campaign. The email will also use scare tactics to remind students of what might happen if they vote for someone other than Mayor Daley. The positive solution-more jobs and a healthy economy-seems easy to reach when students simply vote for Mayor Daley (Appendix 5).

b. Secondary message: Students will be exposed to a variety of print ads that explain Mayor Daley’s contributions to Chicago’s work force. These ads will be placed in the classified section of every campus newspaper and will be placed in the career center of every school. Every ad will emphasize one aspect of the mayor’s contribution to jobs in the city, such as creating more City jobs; having Boeing in Chicago; and the expansion of O’Hare Airport. Each ad will incorporate the theme of “City of Big Shoulders,” a familiar theme for Chicagoans. The repetition of this phrase will increase familiarity, as students will see the phrase and recognize it as part of Mayor Daley’s campaign. Also, the association of “City of Big Shoulders” with the Mayor is a positive one, as the slogan connotes an image of tradition. The slogan also has an image of a strong, masculine persona capable of doing the work of mayor. This ad campaign also emphasizes the balance theory, as students who feel that the O’Hare expansion and the like is good will feel Mayor Daley is a good candidate because he is associated with these job opportunities (Appendix 2, 3, 4).

c. Follow-through message: Emails will be sent to students to tell them about voting for Mayor Daley. The emails will be sent one week prior to the cut-off day for registering to vote and will tell students where they can register to vote in their area. A few days before the elections, students will receive an email reminding them to vote and telling them where they can vote in their area. If students are interested in voting, the campaign needs to take it one step farther and inform them of how and where they can vote (Appendix 5).

5. Students attending DePaul University’s Loop campus.

Students attending DePaul University’s Loop campus are already concerned about safety, as the Loop has one of the highest crime rates in the City of Chicago. This aspect of the campaign will seek to inform them of Mayor Daley’s initiatives to make the city’s streets safer.

a. Initial message: Students will be given pins that say “CAPS: Mayor Daley: Making the streets safer for 10 years” to represent Mayor Daley’s involvement in the community policing program set up through the Chicago Police Department. To receive that pin, students must generate at least two reasons why they should vote for Mayor Daley. This is a form of self-persuasion, because students are actively thinking of reasons why they should vote for Mayor Daley. Students will also be given a pamphlet on Mayor Daley’s political platform to reinforce the sentiments they already have. The pin will also serve as a granfalloon, as the “in” group will be those who support Mayor Daley while the “out” group will be those supporting another candidate. The pin is also an example of the foot-in-the-door technique, as it begins with a small favor, such as asking the students to always wear the pin. The students will be then asked to go to the polls to vote in February. Students will feel obliged because they are committed. To enhance credibility, the people handing out the pins will be similar to the intended audience. For example, the volunteer might be a recent graduate of law school who lives near the Loop campus. Also, the volunteer might be a member of the Chicago Police Department, such as Supt. Terry Hillard. Hillard will be seen as credible because he is in the highest-ranking office in the CPD (Appendix 8).

b. Secondary message: Students will be exposed to a series of fliers throughout the Loop campus to portray Mayor Daley as similar to these students with his attitude towards safety on the streets of Chicago. The fliers will be posted on the building and in nearby El stations. The fliers use identification, as they remind students Mayor Daley went to DePaul University, too, and he understands the importance of a safe ride home from school. The fliers also create a sense of a granfalloon between Mayor Daley and the college students, as both groups are similar in that both worry about safety as graduates and undergraduates (Appendix 9, 10).

c. Follow-through message: In the last week before the cut-off day for registration and in the last few days before students can vote, students at the Loop campus will receive information about the campaign and where they can register to vote in the City of Chicago. This information will be passed out on fliers that have the Chicago Police Department’s logo on it. This association of the CPD with the Mayor is positive, as students will see and understand the connection between the two parties. It also reinforces Mayor Daley’s platform on safety, as students who see the flier will remember his commitment to making Chicago safer (Appendix 5).

IV. Campaign activation.

The timeline for the activation of the campaign is very strict, as there is, at best, a six-week timeline from the activation of the campaign until the actual election.

A. Making audience aware of elections.

The first step of the campaign is to make college students living in Chicago aware of the primaries for the office of mayor. This will be done through several different ways.

1. Activation of job market campaign: students can sign up for more information after having a slice of pizza.

2. Send out fliers to career counselors about the benefits Mayor Daley has brought to the City of Chicago.

3. Hand out fliers to students on their way to class and post announcements in the bulletin boards around the cafeteria.

4. Begin handing out pins at DePaul’s Loop campus about safety.

5. Reminding students to register to vote and telling them where they can vote. The deadline for registering to vote is Jan. 25, so the campaign must emphasize this aspect early on. If students do not register to vote, the rest of the campaign will not be productive, as students will be exposed to messages they cannot act upon.

The initial messages about the campaign will begin within the first two weeks of the second semester. The messages will be sent at this time because if they are sent earlier, such as in the end of the first semester, they risk being forgotten over break. Also, students have finals at the end of the first semester and may be hostile to a campaign that is taking away time that can be used for studying. In the beginning of the semester, however, students are not yet swamped with exams and papers and will be more receptive to the campaign’s messages.

B. Secondary messages.

The next part of the campaign will be concerned with reminding students of the campaign and why they should vote for Mayor Daley. This will go on the assumption that students have registered to vote. This part of the campaign will focus on convincing the students to vote for Mayor Daley and not his opponent.

1. Handing out pins and fliers and call career counselors. A volunteer will be assigned to each career counselor. This is to build up trust and consistency. Every time this volunteer calls, the counselor knows what the message will be because they will remember their volunteer from this campaign. The counselor can also ask the volunteer questions pertinent to the campaign.

2. Busy students will see fliers with the notable Chicagoans endorsing Mayor Daley.

3. Students looking for jobs will be exposed to the print ads reminding them of Mayor Daley’s contributions to Chicago’s work force.

4. Students attending classes in DePaul University’s Loop campus will see fliers about Mayor Daley’s safety programs. This will create an identity with them and the Mayor.

This part of the campaign will focus on getting students to vote for Mayor Daley and informing them of the issues pertinent to his campaign.

C. Follow-through messages.

Getting students interested in voting for Mayor Daley is only half of the problem of this campaign. The crucial element is actually getting students to go out and register to vote and later vote in the primaries. The following messages will be sent within the week prior to the elections. This is to remind students about the election and to remind them that they can make a huge difference in the election’s outcome.

1. Emails will be sent to career counselors to remind them to talk about Mayor Daley’s job initiatives.

2. Emails will be sent to busy students to remind them about the elections and to tell them where to go to vote.

3. Emails will be sent to students looking for a job to remind them about voting.

4. Students at DePaul University’s Loop campus will receive fliers about Mayor Daley’s safety initiatives with a reminder about voting included.

Each reminder will include information about where students can vote. This may include a website address they can access to find where to go in their area. If it is an email, it can be sent by geographic location and the students living in a particular area of Chicago will know where to go in their particular area. This part of the campaign is crucial, because it is the completion of the campaign and every effort must work in order for it to be successful. The campaign will be counterproductive if students are encouraged to vote, but they do not know where to go or why they should vote for Mayor Daley for reelection. This aspect of the campaign will focus on informing students of where they can go to register and to later vote.

V. Campaign conclusion.

The goal of this campaign is to increase the number of college students who will vote in the upcoming primaries for mayor of the City of Chicago. To do that, the general audience of all college students living in Chicago and the specific audiences of students looking for jobs, students attending DePaul University’s Loop campus, career counselors and students who consider themselves to be busy needed to be targeted with persuasive messages to increase awareness, credibility, understanding, and a desire to make a difference through their vote. This campaign plan will enable the campaign volunteers to target these specific groups and to make a difference with the primaries by encouraging more students to vote and to vote for Mayor Daley.