Lessons from the 2014 Campaign.

I am writing this whilst recent events are still

uppermost in our minds, as I believe we need to learn
from what happened.
Please read this not as a criticism, although I am
critical of some aspects, but as constructive
feedback from someone impartial.
Why did we not get to 5 %?
It would be easy to say that we failed because the
Nats were so well supported but that in my opinion
would be only part of the reason.
It would also be correct to say Rachels exit cost us as
it portrayed Colin as manipulative and added to
his creepy persona, but that on its own was not
enough to really hurt us, but it gave Winston Peters
ammunition to damage Colins reputation and cast
doubt in the minds of swinging voters.
Lets face it the Jason Eade debacle was not helpful
to John Key, but his brand was strong enough to
shrug it off.
Colin as a brand was still seen as risky and a bit hard
to understand, so being labeled manipulative was
damaging, and he did not handle this event well
with the media.
Why not release the email?
Why not go on the front foot?
Why leave so many unanswered questions and allow
the media to make their own story?

Another key decision which in hindsight is difficult to

understand is, why when we knew we would have
only a small amount of TV allocation why did we not
spend money before the cut off to get our message
out? We had a story to tell and ground to make up
and electronic media could have helped us engage
with voters and gain attention.
So what were the other issues that caused us to fail?
I believe we failed because of five things
Lack of clarity around core message
Lack of key resource at party HQ
Negative portrayal of Colin as loopy
No effective media relations
Too many last minute decisions
LACK OF CLARITY
When we became involved the first thing that was
apparent was no clear positioning of the Party.
This is why after interrogating your existing brochures
and website we uncovered the 4 main planks which
needed to somehow be brought together to mean
something Referendum, One Law, Tax, Crime.
That is why we suggested, Stand for something as
your rallying cry.
It also made the point that you as a Party have
principles and strong beliefs.

It was a claim that was true and it was competitive

as it suggested other Political Partys did not really
stand for anything, (other than getting elected).
This Stand for Something positioning line worked
well and we brought it to life with our July press ads
which dealt with each topic in turn and we created
the www.standforsomething microsite to allow
readers to find out more, in a concise manner.
We believed our target audience of voters are
intelligent, and would respond well to a reasoned
argument laid out for them, which brought the
particular core issue to their attention. (and dealt to
the loony tag Colin had acquired).
But we never followed through.
After July, Colin changed all the billboards and
removed the line stand for something, he wanted
very sparse one word signs that said for example
One law which on its own might mean something
to those who are engaged in politics but for the
undecided voters they were easy to ignore.
This was an ongoing issue that we never solved;
The dilemma of;
Were we talking to the potential voters?
Or were we connecting with our loyal base of voters
who gave us 2.6% last time?
Our focus was on getting the new people on board,
but Colin seemed to be concerned about the party
faithful.

This I believe proved to be a fatal flaw, as Colin

changed the well thought out press approach for the
last week Make your Party Vote Stand for
Something and used the funds to send out more
brochures.
I have always believed that brochures have an
important role to play, but they need air cover to
work properly.
You do not read something stuck in your letterbox
unless you have an interest sparked by an impression
you have gained from other sources, an awareness
of who the sender is and what they are about.
I understand Colin believes passionately about mail
drops but I believe people are getting very selective
about what they consider that is sent to them,
(particularly during an election) and unless they
already have some connection to the author it is very
often ignored.
Colin said to me the mail drops worked last time
and yes they did, they delivered 2.6%, and again this
time they delivered that.
But we needed more and that is why I was so
disappointed when he cancelled the last weeks
press and then made, in my opinion, a mess of the
final ad and its message.
Why abandon the Stand for Something theme we
had developed and replace it with People you can
trust?

It was reactionary to the dirty politics saga and it was

ill advised.
The swinging voter was not going to respond to that
ad, they did not trust any political party, and we
needed to explain how they could make their Party
Vote count.
We should have been convincing the undecided to
vote Conservative rather than carpet-bombing the
whole country with mail drops and letters.
I really recommend you invest in some research to
assess the effectiveness of the mailers or Colin will
make the same mistake in 2017.
Lack of Resource
This was a critical issue;
Some budget should have been allocated to ensure
the Party machine operated efficiently.
I was amazed when I first met you how thin on the
ground you were.
Regan was swamped at times.
Andrew was stretched.
Christine was so tired her health gave up.
There was no obvious cohesive team working
together even after Colin moved into the building.
There was no clarity around the CEO role.
Christine was effectively sidelined as Colin made all
decisions.
This led to confusion, time wasting and frustration all
round.
Colin needs to understand that he cannot appoint
someone and then not give him or her the authority
to operate.

The Party understandably has been totally focused

on Colin Craig, but the Party is now, and must be in
the future, bigger than one individual and Colin
needs to set a clear direction, delegate and then let
people get on with it.
And by trying to do it all himself Colins health also
began to fail towards the sharp end of the
campaign, just when he needed to be on top form.
The lack of resource was also apparent around the
media relations. Colin has no one in a Chief of staff
role and he needs one.
Rachel was ineffective and at times embarrassing,
but Colin seemed very confident about her ability
when outside the Party she was poorly regarded and
at times a laughing stock.
Her departure was a disaster.
What happened?
What caused her to turn against Colin and label him
manipulative which the left wing media loved and
amplified?
We need to know, as a journalist will be digging.
And finally regarding resource, we needed visibility of
the Party at the coalface where voters could
engage.
I continually suggested a pop up shop in Browns Bay
staffed by HQ people, visible to the voters and real
and tangible, somewhere people could walk in and
meet a member of the staff and see for themselves
what the Conservatives were about.

Not just relying on a mention of the Conservatives in

the newspaper or on TV for those interested to get
the feel of the Party.
But that idea went nowhere, because of lack of
resource, that is nonsense it went nowhere because
there was no one available to drive it and Colin was
not listening.
The day after Colin announced in East Coast Bays we
should have been in the midst of it all.
Colins image and persona
When we came onboard we quickly identified that
Colin was being demonized by the media for some
slightly nave and perhaps unwise comments often
taken out of context which the left wing media and
the opponents seized upon and labeled loony,
weird, strange etc.
And then, the strange photos he allowed of himself in
the long grass etc. compounded this.
These continued to haunt us and are still out there
today.
Our advice was to take this head on and we used
the July press to defuse this with ads that
communicated our 4 core policies.
Binding Referendum and other crazy ideas etc.
It worked, by the end of July the media were
backing off and taking him more seriously.

But again we did not follow up with the digital plan

we had in place, as Colin wanted to move budget
to fund the replacement of his face on the billboards.
This was nonsense. And frankly slightly vain on Colins
part.
We selected the serious shot of him because we
wanted him to look serious.
Not your normal smiley politician.
Okay, the shot that we used from your files was
severe and he got comment about it but that was
what we wanted.
They were being noticed.
In the end his hoardings got more publicity and
exposure than any other party and people saw it for
what it was, the left having a go at Colin and having
a crack at him.
The point is that Colin was worried that the Party
faithful did not like them, but who cares they are
going to vote for him anyway, the people we
wanted to engage with were still making up their
minds and the noise around the billboard helped
until we went soft and started replacing his with a
smile.
A waste of resource and a bad signal to the media
that Colin was a narcissist.
And his edict that nothing was to be displayed in HQ
or sent out with the unsmiling face was pure ego.
Visitors and staff should have been able to see our
press ads and key messages .

Colins media relations were not great; he mistakenly

thought the media were his friends.
They are not.
They want a story and if they can get one by
trapping a politician they will.
I personally killed several negative stories that were
being worked on through my own relationships with
journalists.
There were too many missed opportunities such as
The Campbell Live leaders at home segment,
which unless it happened after I left NZ had still not
been organized even though I gave Rachel John
Campbells private mobile number.
We needed a more effective media relations person
to make sure things happened.
The other problem is that Rachel had no
communication with HQ.
No one knew what was happening with Colins
media commitments and she made no effort to work
with Christine, Andrew and the wider team.
This wasted time; meant decisions could not be
made and created a big void between Colin and
the wider operation.
Next time, you need a Chief of staff, and a proper
media /PR person.
And Colin needs to respect more the professionals
who have been hired to provide expert advice.

I managed to forge a relationship with him, but it was

not as it should have been and I could have
contributed more had I been allowed.
He believes he has great judgment as to what
advertising and promotion should look like, and from
my experience he doesnt.
He should not allow his personal feelings to override
professionals who know what they are doing.
I have worked on political campaigns for three
decades, yet Colin seemed to think he knew better
than me and had more creative ability.
The fact is, he has no feeling for communication.
He is far to lineal and does not understand
composition and emotion.
He is a property man not an advertising expert.
And Colins refusal to write a speech prior to a
meeting was just daft.
The media are used to getting speeches
embargoed, and use them to write their stories or
prepare their coverage. Colins refusal to do this
meant he could be misreported, or the facts could
be wrong and he had no way of refuting this.
And it meant he strayed off message at times.
No effective media relations
I think I have covered this in the sections above, but it
was a real Achilles heel and cost us dearly.

Last minute decisions

Any campaign must be flexible and able to respond
to changing circumstances, but you do need a basic
plan that you agree and stick with.
A plan to get your brand platform agreed, and
established, your key positions understood, your
campaign theme, your key messages nailed.
An agreement on who is the key audience we need
to convince.
We tried to do this but Colin refused to commit and
things were done piecemeal.
Things were stalled and key programs like how East
Coast Bays could help our national effort were never
planned properly.
The Epsom decision was too late, and it was a
nonsense and disrespectful that Colin had research
regarding Epsom that he would not share with
Christine or people like me who could have
benefitted by this.
Now I understand there are reasons behind the late
announcement of Christine standing, and I am not
wanting to be overly critical, but frankly too many
things were left to the last minute and we always
new September 20 was the date from March 2014
when John Key announced the date.
A strategic group should have been formed earlier, a
strategy developed, research undertaken to
establish voter priorities.
Key roles should have been assigned and regular
meetings planned.

Colin appeared to operate as a one man band

and that disempowered the team.
NOW SOME POSITIVES
We increased our vote.
Our awareness grew.
We became seen as a contender
Of the minor parties we punched above our
weight.
Colin grew in stature during the campaign and was
more assured in interviews etc.
Adding people like Christine and Garth gave the
Party more credibility.
The media gave us credit for running a professional
campaign.
Finally,
The question I have is will Colin and the Party, Board
etc., learn from this experience?
Colin has now had two cracks and used the same
core strategy of letters and mailers and fallen short.
The party organization was found wanting.
Some tough questions need to be asked.
I would hate to think we fall into the same trap again
next time, as Einstein said,
the definition of insanity is doing the same thing
over and over and expecting a different result .