Local TV Preferred Method of Advertisement Among Presidential Candidates

During the first quarter of 2012, campaigns for the five leading U.S. presidential candidates—Newt Gingrich, Barack Obama, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum—placed nearly 66,000 advertisements on local broadcast media, according to Nielsen.

Mitt Romney’s camp placed over half of those ad units (57%), while the other Republican candidates made up nearly a third of all units placed (32%) with President Obama’s ads accounting for the remaining 11 percent. Not surprisingly, spot TV was the top choice among all candidates for reaching potential voters, representing nearly 75 percent of all ad units, followed by local/regional cable networks. Rick Santorum’s campaign showed the greatest balance between the two mediums, placing 59 percent of ads on local TV stations and 34 percent on regional cable networks. President Obama’s team leaned more towards spot TV and placed over 80 percent of ads on those stations. Ads for Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney saw the largest share of local radio placements among the candidates, 13 percent and 12 percent of total campaign advertisements, respectively.