Conclusion: Political marketing practice and ethics

Political marketing involves strategy, market research, branding, communication and delivery. Political marketing is used to help organisations build positive relationships with their market, which includes stakeholders such as voters, members, donors, staff, lobbyists, groups and the media. This chapter summarises how political marketing is used in practice and discuss ethical implications. Political marketing involves researching the market, strategising about how best to respond to it in terms of what decisions to make and which policies to pursue, and organising resources including volunteers, staff and budgets, as well as communicating. Political marketing practitioners work in strategy, market research, branding, internal organisation, communication and delivery. Practitioners take different approaches to the way they use political marketing. The best overarching research philosophy for political marketing that allows for varied methods is pragmatism, because it aims to have a potential practical application by identifying what works.