Gov. Noem’s Freedom Works Here Ad Wins National Award
PIERRE, S.D. – Governor Kristi Noem’s Freedom Works Here Ad, “Bright Side,” won a national award for Best TV Ad at this year’s Reed Awards.
“When I kicked off Freedom Works Here, my goal was to tell South Dakota’s story to the entire nation,” said Governor Noem. “I am blown away by the national recognition these ads have brought to South Dakota – and people are moving here because of it! We have welcomed thousands of people to our state and are looking forward to welcoming even more.”
Freedom Works Here is the most successful workforce recruitment campaign in South Dakota history. 9,361 people have expressed interest in moving to South Dakota, and over 2,300 have worked directly with our job experts to begin the process – many are already here!
To learn more, visit FreedomWorksHere.com.
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Reed Awards? Who?
I looked at their site and they say this in their first paragraph: “The Reed Awards & Conference is the ultimate event for campaign professionals.”
Psst. Those were NOT “campaign” ads. They were legitimate state expenditures. Remember?
And this from their site… “The Reeds is the campaign industry event of the year. Not just because it brings together the very best political campaign professionals in the world, but also because the agenda is designed to help attendees take their work to the next level and grow their businesses. Put another way, from the conference to the dedicated Democratic and Republican Strategy Sessions, the Reeds is the ultimate brain trust for campaign pros.”
Always the haters and naysayers….that is why she is Governor and you are not.
Thankfully, I don’t hate anyone. It would be a sad way to live. Disagreeing with someone… is not hate.
Kristi Noem is a beautiful and talented person.
This isn’t the flex she thinks it is. Basically, recognition for developing campaign ads on the taxpayers dime. The grift is strong with her.
Seems like a win-win-win-win. Except for the losing ad agencies.
So it’s a win for taxpayers to cover her personal campaign costs? Grudz, stick to the gravy and taters that you understand.
While there are many reasons to have differences with the Governor but one looks foolish and ignorant to include this. Just the free media around the country makes this campaign a great bargain.
Ask any manufacturer if they have had an uptick in unsolicited inquiries since these ads went up and they’ll say yes. I know two Sioux Falls HR managers who are liberal and Democrat and they are effusive over the effectiveness of these ads (in at least one to secretly support her) and the corresponding exposure SD is getting. Same with any Chamber or Development professional and they’ll say the same thing on and off the record. Realtors too.
Now that Sioux Falls is resolving its housing shortage (and I hear so are other SD cities), I expect these ads to stimulate business relocations as soon as these potential employers have confidence their employees will have housing.
Nobody ever makes all good decisions or bad decisions and only fools always find praise or criticism.
So which side are you on, praise or criticism?
Kristy has done both good and bad. She needs to admit to both and that does not happen. She seeks praise and never admits her faults.
“9,361 people have expressed interest in moving to South Dakota, and over 2,300 have worked directly with our job experts to begin the process – many are already here!”
OK. Enough already. They know how many have “expressed interest” in moving to SD. They know how many have “begun the process”. But, all we hear is “many” are already here. Many?
The Governor’s office has said this enough times now. Find out. As others have suggested, they could simply text, email, or call them. Duh.
Then… be honest and tell us exactly how many of those 9,361 people have actually moved here as a direct result of the ads. Until then, I will assume that this was just a very expensive, state-funded campaign for Vice President.
Of course you will “assume”. You are one of the fools who thinks people are all bad and can do no good or all good and can do no bad.
But, you are also dumb. An entire advertising, marketing, and sales (AMS) industry is based the premise “many” wouldn’t otherwise purchase the product but for the AMS efforts and nobody says the AMS effort is a waste unless they knew “exactly how many” bought because of those efforts.
Disagree with Noem on many things if you choose but not since around statehood has the awareness of South Dakota as a place to live and work been higher thanks to these efforts.
Most South Dakotans would both relish and be proud of this reality regardless of their views of the spokesperson.
Unfortunately Elk, your all-inclusive hatred of Noem has turned you into a babbling stupid fool incapable of enjoying the acknowledgment where you make your home is thought so well by so many people all across America.
You need help.
I know. It’s easier to call me names than to address the common sense need for accountability. You are angry, not because I have questions, but because you have no answers. They either know these numbers or they should get them. They are bragging about results… so let’s see them.
You think that’s too much to ask? We all paid for those ads.
You are an advertisers dream. You probably only care about impressions and not clicks or conversions. If this thing is so successful, releasing the final.numbers shouldn’t be a problem. Here we are, holding an empty bag being told that it was successful but you just have to “believe”.
In addition, she targeted those ads to Republican debate watchers and conservative viewers. Try to explain that. I would love to hear your answer.
Remember— not all campaigns are political campaigns. People in the industry talk about marketing campaigns quite often! So when they say campaigns, they very easily could be thinking of an advertising campaign. But we’re politicos who see everything through political goggles. So when we see the word campaigns, we automatically think political campaigns.
That might be source of the confusion. 🙂
That is true.
But the organization giving the award is politically oriented. And the ads… well… they were produced by an out-of-state political operation and directed at a Republican audience. And the ads just happen to coincide with a not-so-secret effort to become VP.
Smart Guy Elk (I don’t want to insult you), you do know dismissing a view because of who they are is a logic fallacy, a form of lying.
That said, there is significant of empirical and anecdotal evidence of increased awareness and actual action directly tied to this marketing effort.
Your ignoring (by definition making you ignorant, a characterization directly from your words and lack of intellectual vigor and integrity and not calling your over sensitive reaction to assessment of your mental clarity) and dismissal of anything that might cause you to give credit to Noem makes you a fool and stupid. To give you a pass is to reject your inalienable human dignity.
South Dakota has increased national awareness as a good place to live and work, a fact I celebrate.
Well, Dr. Freud… I didn’t know that I was so deeply flawed.
But it’s a simple thing, really. They could just answer the question. How many have actually moved here?
They’ve been asked over and over and still no answer. Curious, isn’t it.
Wow, it is curious since you have been asked to do the very same thing concerning other subjects and you can’t.
Ask Ford how many cars they sold because they had a marketing campaign.
Ask 100 companies.
All 100 will look at you and put you on the wall as the dumbest person to walk thru their halls.
Your hatred of Noem has made you a stupid petty moron.
As someone who works in marketing, every company wants to know ad conversion rates. Lead generation is what many of these companies use and affiliate payments are made by the number and amount of sales. You dont have a clue what you are talking about when it comes to sales and marketing. If you can’t guage the results, then there is no way to determine its success. Your anecdotes don’t count. I know many out of staters that like Noem and could care less about SD. That is what her adds were about. Self promotion. She is Janklow 2 but extremely less effective.
I’d love to know your firm to know not to use it. Lead generation is a great metric but it isn’t the only one to determine success.
Brand and image campaigns measure changes in awareness, impression, etc. Most of our Tourism ads focus on brand/image/awareness for the long-term and not short term “sales.”
Retailers might monitor foot traffic changes in addition or even besides measuring sales of the actual product advertised (lots of reasons).
This campaign had elements of all three making each of its measurable difficult, especially because they will never know how many unsolicited applications employers received either directly from this campaign or from employers efforts enhanced by this campaign.
But, the anecdotes do matter. If you’ve been an employer almost perpetually short 2 or 3 experienced machinists and suddenly you are fully staffed because of new employees from Illinois or Pennsylvania, possibly a file of prospects if housing is more readily available, and other employers hiring similar employees say the same thing, it would be unrealistic to think a hiring environment that has been tight for decades changed by happenstance.
For the record, I didn’t vote for either candidate for Governor last election. But, I am willing to give her credit on this matter because she pushed it and was the face of this campaign whose success exceeded my expectations as it had been tried many times before with less tangible immediate success experienced by employers.
P.S. I took marketing many years ago. I’ve also directly or indirectly been involved in the authorization of literally tens of millions, maybe into the hundreds, of sales, marketing and advertising, especially if you include sales salaries and commissions.
This may qualify as anecdotal evidence…
“2023 proved to be more of an average year of population growth in our community, which was to be expected after a couple of historic years of growth,” said Mayor Paul TenHaken. (SDPB 1/15/2024)
lol 9:54 Anon has clearly never set foot in a marketing class. Dunning-Krueger in action folks!
It’s called a lead to close ratio. Standard care in all direct marketing cost/benefit analysis
Unfortunately “closes” aren’t identifiable as who knows how many people particular employers hired as the direct result of this campaign.
People who measure clicks, forwards to a website, and ordering a $10 trinket, using lead/close ratio works. On big ticket items, it’s a significantly more sophisticated for the business but we might use some ratio like that to judge the quality of are direct marketing firm.
Brand/product awareness campaigns where the “close” occurs at thousands of employers (ala retailers) and are concurrent with employers use of employment agencies, employers use various job listing websites where they can give detail on the job (significantly more complex than a $10 trinket), and job fairs across the country is not the same as selling trinkets via direct marketing.
The marketing process to get a person to relocate his family is closer to the process of marketing $1 million machining centers where direct marketing is primarily about awareness and education on product changes/enhancements/advantages.
But, since you marketing geniuses think it’s like selling trinkets over the internet, it is no surprise you are unable to assess whether this campaign was successful or not.
“Freedom Works Here is the most successful workforce recruitment campaign in South Dakota history. 9,361 people have expressed interest in moving to South Dakota…”
Kristi Noem is putting out that number… 9,361. Is that number meaningless or is it real? If it’s real, then ask them if they moved here. It’s not too complicated.
If only a few in THAT group actually made the move, then it’s unlikely the ads did much more than give the governor national exposure.
It is that complicated. Like the guy whose expertise is on the direct marketing part of sales, marketing and advertising said, direct marketing has a mechanism to generate a direct response (website/phone are most common today). I suspect that is where that number came from.
But, that isn’t entirety of impact from the comprehensive campaign run. Some started conversations with their spouse, some maybe put their resume up on employment websites, some searched for job listings of companies in their specialty, some looked at vocational training or higher education opportunities in our state, some started looking at the list of companies coming to job fairs and if they had South Dakota operations, and on and on and on.
The assertion there is an easy metric to judge effectiveness of a campaign like this is not possible. Yes, there are some measures you can do to judge how good your direct marketing firm did to stimulate a direct response. While many companies will demand justifications and measurements to their marketing firms on their piece but in the end they judge the effectiveness of all their efforts to build sales and brand holistically by looking at new product development, customer service, product quality, understanding the needs of customers, and yes sales, marketing and advertising.
Bottom line: Governor Noem pounced on a unique time in history (maybe not seen since the depression or end of WWII where significant segments of people in different areas of the nation are looking to relocate) to give Americans across the nation an impetus and opportunity to look at our state as a place to live and work.
And, when you ask employers and other similar stakeholders, we have filled many skilled positions where we have been chronically short and given these same and potential employers the brightest outlook regarding growing their companies in year.
One can see all the Reed Award winners here on the sponsor (Campaigns and Elections) page. The specific award is:
Best TV Ad – 30 Seconds (Republican)
SD Governor’s Office of Econ Dev. – “Electrician”
The Strategy Group Co.
Link:
https://campaignsandelections.com/awards/reed-awards/2024-reed-award-winners/
I thought the Governor took a risk that she might look light weight and foolish. She may have, but I’m not the target audience.