Started in the last quarter of 2021, C4C provided technical assistance to Sindikasi Pemilu dan Demokrasi (SPD) to implement a campaign titled “Cek Suaramu”, urging changes to the high electoral thresholds for presidential and vice presidential candidates which suppresses citizens' rights to be elected.

The online campaign started from May 23 to July 24, 2022 (63 days), and used a game titled “Cek Suaramu” as a “bait” to attract the attention of campaign targets. In addition, the campaign used paid advertising to increase engagement of short videos on Facebook and Instagram, and hired two social media influencers.

The campaign was successful in planting seeds of knowledge about the problematic electoral threshold to ordinary people and also to those outside the echo chamber of activism.

Understanding the audience before running the campaign
Prior to running this campaign, in November 2021 C4C conducted a survey of internet users in the age range of 18-33 years old. In this survey, we found that 56% of young internet users in Indonesia knew about the electoral threshold rule. However, 52% of them agreed with the statement “the fewer candidates, the better”.

People who have no idea of the electoral threshold are more likely among those aged 22 and above. However, it’s worth noting that even if they are more likely to disagree with the statement “the fewer the candidates, the better”, it could be that people in this age range who have voted before feel the need for more presidential candidates.

Given this, there are two things that the campaign needs to do:

1. Change lay opinion, from “electoral threshold rules are fine” to “threshold rules need to be fixed”.
2. Address the concerns of those who feel they lack presidential options.

​​Since the message has to reach as many people as possible, it needs to reach those who are currently outside the echo-chamber of democratic activism, not followers of the SPD or similar organizations on social media.

With this in mind, we decided to take a fun approach in the form of an online game called Cek Suaramu where players would measure their hero's chances, but the result would always be 0% due to the overly strict threshold rule. Involving heroes they are familiar with, we are trying to frame electoral threshold from something they are foreign about to be more relatable and easier to digest.

Meanwhile, to invite campaign targets outside the echo chamber to visit the game, we used paid advertising in the form of short videos aired on Facebook and Instagram. The influencer posts in this campaign were only used to convey the message, not to invite people to play the game.

Ads and games were successful in exposing initial information for the audience
These ads were more appealing to those aged 25-34, who according to our baseline survey, were not fully aware of the presidential nomination threshold rule. They are also the ones who tend to disagree with the statement that “the fewer presidential candidates, the better”. It's worth noting that political-themed ads will only be served by Meta platform to internet users aged 21 and above.

In total, the campaign reached 1,910,432 people. Of all the individuals reached, the number of game players on the site who completed and received the message about the problematic electoral threshold was 28,723 unique users.

Meanwhile, the total views of the game's end-screen were 42,440 views, meaning that some players retried the game and read the electoral threshold issue more than once.

The right plan can make a campaign more cost-effective
The campaign, which ran for 63 days, reached out to ordinary people outside the activism echo chamber in a very short time. The total cost incurred to carry out the campaign on social media was IDR 50 million and generated 28,723 total players. Thus, the cost of exposing the electoral threshold problem in 63 days is Rp 1,752 per person.
We can compare this to the cost of 1 to 2 webinars per month with an assumed average cost of around IDR 8,000,000. One webinar can reach 100 to 300 participants per webinar so the cost of the message per person is around Rp20,000 - Rp160,000.

Another thing to keep in mind is that the 100 to 300 people who want to take part in this webinar are people who basically already have an interest in the issues discussed, not a new audience. So it can be concluded that webinars have not been able to break the echo chamber.

At the end of the day, while we can push our message through paid advertising and influencers, the users who stick around to the end are the result of a game concept that intrigues them. This is the C4C way of running campaigns: a creative approach that moves away from topics that the campaign target already cares about or "meet people where they are”, which we achieve through process:

• Start by investing in a baseline survey to identify your audience.
• Resist the urge to directly “educate” the layperson on issues, but try to find a way in through topics that already concern or interest them.

Then use paid advertising with the right creative approach to pursue more cost-effective results to penetrate the echo chamber. Details about this campaign cost comparison can be read in our article.

If you also believe that creative persuasion is one of the ways to drive issues, then we are ready to help you. Schedule a free 1-hour consultation by clicking the contact button below and let's discuss how to get started.