Digital First Creative.
Gone are the days when a single TV ad could effectively reach a diverse electorate. Today, voters interact with campaigns across multiple digital touchpoints, from social media and websites to mobile apps and streaming services. To truly resonate, creative content must be tailored for each platform, considering the unique characteristics and expectations of digital audiences.
Simply repurposing TV ads for digital channels can lead to disengagement and missed opportunities. Digital platforms offer dynamic features—like interactivity, personalization, and real-time feedback—that can transform how a message is delivered and received. Effective digital-first creative must build on your overall campaign narrative while engaging voters in a dialogue and encouraging participation. By leveraging formats like video, streaming audio and podcast ads, and animated display advertising, campaigns can create immersive experiences that captivate and convert. Below are some examples of our work.
The Effective Progressive: Chuy Garcia
Congressman Chuy Garcia was facing a tough challenge from a Chicago City Alderman. We took the opportunity to build a narrative around Chuy as the “effective progressive.” In the end, our heavy digital campaign slammed the door on Ray Lopez, spanking him at the ballot box 69%-31%.
Streaming Audio – “Effective Progressive”
Streaming Audio – “Lives”
Animated Display
Making a splash in San Francisco
In San Francisco, we needed a digital-first ad that would, well, make a splash. This ad titled, “Speedo” was created for the Residents Opposing Aaron Peskin for Mayor 2024. Mayoral elections in San Francisco are run by a ranked choice system. Our internal research showed that it wasn’t enough to get voters to simply vote for someone else, we needed voters to not rank Aaron Peskin anywhere on their list.
In this spot, we leaned into Aaron Peskin’s personal predilection for swimming in a Speedo. In fact, our opponent even cut his own positive ad swimming in the San Francisco Bay near Alcatraz. We knew our follow up ad could shed some light on Peskin’s well-documented record of bullying, harassing, and threatening people to get his way.
In politics, few tools are as effective as humor when it comes to disarming your opponent. When voters laugh at your opponent, it not only diminishes their credibility but also fosters a sense of camaraderie among the electorate. By showcasing your opponent’s flaws in a humorous way, you empower voters to see beyond the rhetoric, encouraging them to choose candidates who resonate with their values and sense of integrity.
Winning for California’s First Openly LGBTQ+ Statewide Elected Official
California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara faced unusual amount of opposition in 2022 from a handful of challengers in the June primary where the top two voter-getters would compete on the November ballot.
We knew he needed to tell voters about the actions he took as Insurance Commissioner that helped them in their daily lives. In this digital-only ad we told the story of how during the pandemic, Insurance Commissioner Lara took action to help drivers he believed were being overcharged.
On Primary Election Night, Lara, the state’s first openly LGBTQ+ statewide elected official, won his reelection primary advancing to the November election (which he also won). Award-winning actress Stockard Channing voiced the spot.
Increasing Native Vote in Battleground Wisconsin
Tribal leaders, grassroots organizations, and Native Vote – a project of Wisconsin Conservation Voices, had excellent organizing efforts underway that needed “air cover.” Our role was to provide that “air cover” and help increase Native voter participation (non-partisan) through cutting-edge digital/social advertising and more traditional terrestrial radio efforts. To be effective, we knew our messages and messengers needed to be authentic.
“Wisconsin’s Native voters provided a vital boost for Biden and Harris. There was a concerted nonpartisan effort in 2020 to increase participation by… the Wisconsin Native Vote project… to boost voter turnout.” – CapTimes, 11/17/2020
Digital Shorts
Animated Display
California’s Prop 19: Embracing Cutting-Edge Tech to Do More with Less
Early polling showed us California’s Proposition 19 would be a close race. 
The proposition was a complex, multi-faceted measure. The ballot language limited property taxes for seniors, wildfire victims, people ages 55 and older, and Californians with severe disabilities.
The measure also closed tax loopholes for wealthy trust fund heirs and increased funding for fire protection, emergency response, and schools.
Because of Prop 19’s complexity, we needed to communicate in a way voters could understand. That’s where the storytelling came in.
We framed the issue in stories that showed how individuals could be affected collectively and then created individual vignettes of each aspect of the ballot proposal, where we told stories of people with disabilities, wildfire victims, and people 55 and older.
These digital video vignettes and animated story ads helped turn a complex issue into personal stories that were memorable.
In the end, Prop 19 won with a little over 51% of the vote while other California ballot measures lost despite spending $40-60 million dollars more than Prop 19.
Conquering a mountain of paperwork…
San Francisco’s Prop E was always going to be difficult, if not near impossible, to pass. While crime was at record levels in the city, San Francisco voters were reluctant to provide the police with expanded authority to fight crime.
Prop E would allow officers to pursue violent suspects if done fairly and safely, and it gave officers access to modern technology like publicly available camera footage and drones. But, given voter reservations on expanded law enforcement surveillance, the aspect of the proposition’s language we focused most on was the amount of paperwork that officers had to do throughout their day that prevented them from actually getting out of the office to fight crime.
Instead of a hard-line crime fighting and “THE POLICE NEED THIS” message, we went with a more light-hearted approach to the creative to soften a call for expanded police powers.
On Election Day, Prop E passed with 54% of the vote – shocking many political observers throughout the state and nationally. The LA Times noted that San Francisco, “boosts police powers in stunning tough-on-crime shift.”
Streaming Audio – “Triplicate”