Some DUers have wondered who's behind the great ads for Bloomberg's campaing. Politico explains:

[highplainsdem]

https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2020/02/28/bloomberg-2020-president-campaign-political-ads-siegel-knapp-117939

So, as he set out to build his audacious presidential campaign, Bloomberg knew he would need to become far better known to Americans. His internal polling showed that while voters might be familiar with the name “Bloomberg,” they’d absorbed little about his biography, his record as New York City mayor or his motivations for wanting to oust Trump from the White House. Bloomberg, with his limitless cash, would need to do in a few months what Trump had done over many years. So, when the time came to handpick his image makers, Bloomberg turned to the only guys he knew who could possibly do what had never been done: Bill and Jimmy.



Bill Knapp, a veteran ad maker and media strategist who held senior roles in three Democratic presidential campaigns and was part of the ad team on a fourth, planned to spend the election at home in Washington working on down-ballot races. Jimmy Siegel, who took a step back nearly 15 years ago from an advertising career in which he dreamed up commercials for Pepsi, Visa and Schwab to write novels and make TV ads for politicians, should be preparing for the release of his fifth thriller. He was finishing edits when Bloomberg’s team called.

Together, the two men are now the creative heartbeat of the biggest advertising cannonade in presidential history. Before he arrived on the debate stage last week in Las Vegas, Americans were getting to know—and even like—the Mike Bloomberg they met in 30- and 60-second intervals between Jeopardy! questions and spins of the Wheel of Fortune. Behind more than a half-billion dollars in ad spending, the campaign worked better than basically all of Washington imagined it would. It helped vault Bloomberg into second place in some national polls, and into serious contention in Super Tuesday states, presenting him as the competent anti-Trump in places most Democrats had yet to air commercials of their own. Bloomberg’s bet on Bill and Jimmy seemed to be paying.

But then Bloomberg showed up in Vegas. That night, when the pent-up frustrations of his rivals all landed on his chin, Bloomberg shuffled off the stage having failed to match the management avatar they built up over nearly three months on the air. He recovered marginally on the debate stage Wednesday in Charleston, S.C., elbowing Trump while landing an early zinger on Bernie Sanders over reports that Vladimir Putin’s Russia was interfering in the election on his behalf. But the debates have laid bare the chasm between the controlled, even polished Bloomberg that viewers saw during commercial breaks and the stilted, prickly campaigner who took a pounding from Elizabeth Warren.

-snip-

Much more at the link.

[riversedge]

1. I have seen some. They are good--and effective I believe.

[BusyBeingBest]

2. He definitely comes off better in venues other than debates, from debate clips I've seen.

I'm not a debate watcher. Part of it is probably lack of experience relative to people who have been lawyers, who have been in the Senate for a while, or went thru nine previous debates. Part of it may be that he's certainly used to being treated with a little deference, which he wasn't going to get on the debate stage.

[MyOwnPeace]

3. Great stuff...........

interesting history about some very good ad makers - and the ones they are making for Bloomberg are certainly very good!
Let's hope the Democratic nominee can put them to good use in the general campaign.

[stopdiggin]

4. they're playing a single ad in my area

over, and over. And .. this one anyway, doesn't impress at all!

It's the "JUST WON'T WORK" speech/soundbite. Stilted, wooden. Fakey as hell. Don't know who the focus group was here, but ... Isn't getting it done. Just doesn't cut it.

(I hear there are others that are impressive ... I'll have to take your word ...)

[Moderateguy]

5. He has an excellent team...

and the democrats should take full advantage of that in the general