Your name is your brand. Sets you apart as the strategic competitor. Your name will help voters see you as yourself. Remember – all that is printed on the ballot is your name… plain – simple. A lot like a wooden headstone on Boot Hill… Here lay WHO? YOU! Your name is key to your entire relevancy as a candidate.
Win or lose, the one thing from the start you are guaranteed to come away with is your name. So protect it because it’s going to be battered around in a campaign to the point there might be days you wish you could change it.
Domain names – buy several, the very first being the one with your name in it that no one – only you – can own. Go to www.Get.Vote and get your FirstLast.vote. The one no one out there in a .com or .org can cyber-squat, malign, or degrade. Once you’ve got that protection going with your name the domain shopping needs to continue. And in your campaign domain shopping buy those using the office you are running for and those someone can slip your name into. Protect your brand - Go to Get.Vote to get your name.
Before you run, Google yourself. What’s being said about you, or has been said? Are there postings out there in which you are, or could be, confused with someone else? Do you and the name attached to YOU… look good in a fishbowl? It’s in this moment when you are examining who you are and the worth of the name you carry and voters will be looking for on that ballot, it’s now before it comes to that point, ask yourself… would you vote for YOU?
What is the value of your name? It has been said a person’s name is what defines them. And any good public relations people, or media consultants you can talk to going into a campaign are going to agree with that statement. Otherwise, why are they going to care about the colors you choose for the campaign that will frame your name on lawn signs, brochures, and be carefully written about in push polls that will be done with the single purpose of making the potential voter have a positive feeling about your name when they hear or see it.
Dependent upon the race and position being sought after, you will see meetings called for the soul purpose of determining if your name, even your signature, translates graphically – will it look good on lawn signs, social media and billboards – as well as to how it sounds for radio and television.
Will you “live up to” your name? Going into this campaign make sure to remember your family more than likely gave you the name that’s eventually going on that ballot, because of what they hoped or expected of you. As the candidate it needs to be stressed to campaign volunteers and staff – all of them are representing YOU and your name when campaigning and need to conduct themselves accordingly.