Politicians need to appeal to the Internet audience, which is bigger than any audience CBS, NBC, ABC and FOX can deliver.

The key to successful online campaigning is to acknowledge some basic truths about the Internet. The first is that broadband use is growing at an extraordinary rate and this high-speed experience is offering a more engaging experience to end-users. Broadband allows the Internet user to become informed, entertained and feel like part of the system -- not used by it.

Other Internet truths are:

• The Internet audience is bigger than what any of the four TV networks can deliver on a day-to-day basis.
• Fundraising and messaging on the Internet is becoming mainstream to politicians and advocacy groups, as witnessed by the fundraising success of Howard Dean and John Kerry.
• The Internet provides unparalleled access to narrowly focused vertical markets, such as politics.
• Creative streaming techniques and formats will continue to improve and enhance user awareness -- and financial contribution potential.
• Budgets for rich media ad formats, such as streaming video and audio, are increasing incrementally.
• Advertisers are learning to think of the Internet as "The Fifth Network" -- politicians must, too.

National and local political campaigns have focused on the tactical implementation of candidate Web sites, and on ways of combining assets that enhance positive messaging and elicit interactive participation, from fundraising to volunteerism. In the popular, high-traffic campaigns, these assets provide a functionality of organization that serves as a bottom-up marketing strategy. Or to better describe it, the Internet adds a flavor of grassroots campaigning.

If we agree that presence on the Internet is a vital part of political campaign strategy today, then we must agree that online marketing is equally important -- and that's where current national and local campaigns are missing remarkable opportunities. This is a result of the current environment in which there is a strange mix of old-guard political consultants and new media gurus that cover the campaign landscape and often do not seem to speak the same language.

To date, the campaign "old guard" has been winning the media and advertising component of this game, with some limited in-roads by the latter. And it's totally understandable because, since the Kennedy era, the power of visual media has become the tried-and-true way to reach voters. It is also true that media clutter has reached a disproportionate level because of ad frequency saturation that is making it more and more difficult to interpret a measured result.

Combine tradition and technology for power

Thus, if the old guard and the new were to combine tradition and technology, individual campaigns would have not only the power of advocacy but also the power of persuasion. The dynamic energy produced by cross-formatting media across multiple platforms could have an overpowering effect.

One of the most important questions being asked today is how to bring all of the creative and strategic assets together to make them work as a cohesive and productive initiative. The answer is online media planning, coupled with individual creative unit functionality and capabilities.

As in any marketing campaign, one must first determine the goal of the campaign, including both branding and response objectives. Are you trying to "sell" your candidate or cause? Or are you trying to persuade a particular constituency to vote for your candidate? Or are you planning to target via age, ethnicity, contextual, or geo or psychological targets? Is there an emphasis on fundraising for the candidate or cause?

A well-coordinated media plan will address these goals.

The playerless streaming media format is particularly interesting and valuable to campaigns because -- as the old guard represents -- marketing television political ads is what they know. Streaming online represents a cross-media formulation metric that, in the end, will provide pertinent and valuable information to the campaign.

For example, an online marketing campaign can test a number of planned TV commercials that a candidate is anticipating running on broadcast TV and running them online to a select regional market or particular demographic. Rich media's reporting capabilities can tell the campaign immediately if any one or all of the TV commercials are creating the intended response. This allows for a quick change to spots that will be more effective -- without spending important financial assets before it's too late. Because online video marketing allows for swapping out the TV spot, it can act as a concurrent conduit for effective marketing.

In the same vein, an extreme online creative ad unit can help you better target your message. For example, a creative unit may have a short polling question that can define the likes and dislikes of a particular group. Thus, the candidate can tailor his message specifically to their interests, and increase the probability of persuasion. That would create a dynamic one-to-one relationship between your candidate and the voter.

Numerous pertinent and important questions are raised when developing an online streaming campaign for politics, and one that is asked most often is, "Would I use a TV spot already produced, or create one specific to the Internet"? The answer to this question is both. However, to create an Internet-friendly spot -- one that is 15-20 seconds in length and encourages the user to become interactively engaged -- would be awesome and groundbreaking.

Imagine a candidate or spokesman pointing to a specific location on the creative unit and asking the user to participate by clicking to contribute or volunteer, call a friend, leave an email address, or request messages be sent to the user's cell phone. It becomes personal and engaging, sort of like the old days when our candidates walked door to door. There are endless possibilities.

We are witnessing a highly engaged interactive community with the large portals and Web publishers finally acquiescing to market demand, creating political news and capturing advertising dollars. We'll see this play out this election cycle. The majors are out in the market place pitching their sites to campaign, political parties, advocacy groups and the like. Pressure from the top to build this vertical is reaching unprecedented highs.

To further the online political market argument, there are some other factors that must be considered that are significant and extremely reasonable in their simplicity:

• Viewer retention and time-related concentration is greater than TV and radio and higher than print media.
• If a candidate is trying to maintain and persuade the end user, we can do it faster, more often and definitively online.

The Fifth Network must be in the mix

Political campaigns plan and buy TV media. They buy network and affiliate television (NBC, ABC, CBS) and they buy cable. These are the four primary broadcast outlets that we are all familiar with when we think of political advertising. They work the GRP's and do the broadcast buy.

But, the Fifth Network is missing in this media mix. Again, we all agree that TV works for political campaigns, so ask the question, "Will streaming TV work on the Internet"? I believe the answer is yes.

When the campaign's media guru plans a TV buy, he or she must look to and consider the same, online. The challenge is finding a market on the Web to target. They wouldn't buy Nickelodeon on broadcast TV or cable, would they? But they'll buy the GRPs and land on 'CSI' on CBS, or the nightly news, or CNN, or Larry King -- because voter reach is greater.

With the online media buy the Web allows and affords us the opportunity to target in a multitude of ways within an individual value that broadcast television cannot. And as far as the often-discussed concern for seamless delivery and coordinating a cross-media marketing plan effectively goes, there are companies in the Internet world that accomplish this daily.

The Internet is something that people do. It's a choice, their decision -- they travel the Web their way and for their own reason and at their own time.

These are powerful dynamics and the ability to tap into them is present and achievable. If political campaigns wish to be successful they must incorporate online into their plans and budgets. They must cross the threshold of traditional methodology and embrace the convergence of new technologies within the online space.

Bill Caspare directs political services integration for Klipmart Corporation, a vendor of rich media solutions. He has worked on numerous political campaigns for Klipmart, including candidates Arianna Huffington, Sen. John McCain and Arizona Secretary of State Jan Brewer. Before joining Klipmart he pioneered several firsts for the industry by incorporating audio and video in Internet advertising.