Kevin Cate: age 29, but “49 in campaign years”; Tennessee native; Tallahassee resident; Auburn and Florida State graduate. He entered politics to “make a change. At the time, it was mainly the war in Iraq.”

He was given his first shots by Rick Penberthy, Alison Morano, Steve Schale, Mark Bubriski and Wendy Riemann, in that order.  Kevin explains, “Rick hired me to run his campaign. Alison made Robert Becker hire me on another campaign and Steve Schale and Mark Bubriski were the only two politicos that made calls for me after the 2006 cycle to help me find work in Tallahassee. I didn’t get that job (with Alex Sink), but my cousin Anthony De Luise introduced me to Wendy Riemann, who hired me at the Department of Health. That eventually led me back to Alex Sink’s office about a year later. That’s a long first shot.”

Keep reading here for an expanded Q&A.

*** Update | April, 4 2013 6:30 PM ***

Senator Nelson is now backing marriage equality. Read more from the Tampa Bay Times. Thank you, Senator.

***

When Bill McCollum started talking about child porn, everyone in the crowd winced. This scenario replayed itself too many times during his time as Attorney General.

My unverified assumption is that a pollster somewhere put a list of issues in front of a focus group or two and asked them to rank issues in the order of importance. Of course, stopping child porn was first and foremost. I wouldn’t even read the rest of the list before marking that as super important for our AG to stop.

So he talked about it, a lot. And he was effective at throwing bad guys in jail.

However, no one ever wanted to hear McCollum talk about it. It was awkward. Furthermore, I seriously doubt anyone voting in the Republican Primary of 2010 questioned whether Rick Scott or Bill McCollum would fight the hardest to stop one of the most disgusting, repulsive acts known to man. They both would.

I often repeat this story because I hate the “rank the issue” polls without context.

But what I hate worse is politicians with an honorable, defendable, position on an issue refusing to say what they believe because of polls.

Let’s be clear, if I were the type of political consultant that I hate, I would tell Bill Nelson that Florida isn’t ready for marriage equality. According to the latest polls, about 40% or so of Floridians say they are ready to stop discriminating against gays.

The same trend lines suggest that by 2016, two years before the time Bill Nelson is running for US Senate again, that number will be about 53%. I don’t believe that it will be that low. I think it will be at least 60% by then, but I digress.

Unless Bill Nelson misled this morning about his interest in running for Governor in 2014 against Charlie Crist, it will be smart poll politics to support equality by the time he faces the voters again. But that’s not my main point.

I do not believe, based on looking at lots of internal and external polls, that supporting marriage equality will negatively impact statewide Democrats in Florida.

Ever again.

It’s no secret that supporting equality will help fundraising. It’s no secret that discriminating against gays will sink a competitive Democratic Primary. But politicians are still operating cautiously, straddling public sentiment.

I haven’t seen a poll in the last four or five years that hasn’t told politicians that creating jobs is the most important factor for voters. Gay marriage isn’t even close.

Watch Rick Scott: family, jobs, education.

Congratulations, you are a political consultant.

What some politicians fail to understand, aside from looking past tomorrow, is that in competitive statewide elections voters see you as a whole, not based on fringe issues. You don’t need to calculate every decision based on polls. You will drive yourself crazy and blur any brand that the polls were supposed to help you develop.

I can point to many single issues that voters didn’t like about Rick Scott, but voters didn’t look at those issues in 2010. They looked at one: jobs. And he won.

I seriously doubt that’s going to change in state politics by 2014 or 2016.

I’ve either staffed or worked with Senator Nelson, Alex Sink, and Charlie Crist, among countless other politicians. I’m begging them here and personally to end the poll politics on gay marriage.

It’s time. Florida voters may not be ready on paper, but they will be by 2014, and they’ve proven over and over that it won’t be a factor in your next election.

If you don’t, history won’t blame the pollsters, history will blame you.

Follow me on Twitter AFTER you ReTweet and Share this article.

Tallahassee, Fla.— Kevin Cate Communications today released an infographic comparing the social media influence of various state’s Capitol Press Corps. Florida tops all other large states in overall Klout, a measurement of social influence across various social media platforms, mainly Facebook and Twitter.

“Florida’s Capitol Press Corps has the most Klout of any state, which is why we are so obsessed with earning our clients social media on top of traditional coverage,” said Kevin Cate, President of Kevin Cate Communications. “People trust news shared by their friends and family and no other press corps in the country has a more influential reach than the reporters covering state government in Tallahassee.”

Now Get Social with Us!

Follow @KevinCate on Twitter and like CateComm on Facebook.

]]> http://www.catecomm.com/2013/02/25/getting-social-with-state-capitol-press-corps/feed/ 0 http://www.catecomm.com/2013/01/30/2013-florida-capitol-press-corps-on-twitter/ http://www.catecomm.com/2013/01/30/2013-florida-capitol-press-corps-on-twitter/#comments Thu, 31 Jan 2013 03:31:09 +0000 admin http://www.catecomm.com/?p=2438 Continued]]> Florida has the strongest capitol press corps in the country, and not just in their paid mediums. We’ve compiled a comprehensive list of reporters based around Tallahassee covering state politics. If we missed someone let us know. Now go follow these people!

Enjoy and Happy Holidays!

Follow @KevinCate and Like Us on Facebook

Kevin Cate Communications is now working on its third year. When I started this firm, my former boss had just lost a race for Governor, my political party held no Cabinet seats, and the other party had a legislative super majority. Couple these realities with a recession, and I might have seemed a little naïve to be opening a new politically focused public relations firm in Tallahassee, Florida.

I wasn’t exactly sure what PR firms did all day, still don’t. I’m also glad that I hadn’t seen an episode of Mad Men before I started my firm. I had no illusions of adding staffers just to add staffers and look like a huge firm. Consequently, when I have a hyper-specific client need, I’m able to hire the best designers, editors, political and media minds – and the buck still stops here.

I started with one client, and I’ve been building it out from there. I still remember how hard I worked on that first client because that’s how hard I work on all of my client projects. No one signs up to be a fourth, fifth, or sixth priority. They are first. The day we lose that edge is the day I will end this business.

In two years, we’ve worked with more than forty clients – some non-profit, some political, some small businesses, some huge businesses. In other words, a lot of people have given me a lot of chances since 2010.

While I appreciate all of the advice I’ve been given, I’m most thankful for the chances. I specifically remember the time that I accepted an invitation to a party, which led to a beer with someone, which led to a lunch meeting with someone else, which led to a client pitch, which led to an important client.

I’ll be thankful for that person forever. And that’s just one example of many.

So instead of just ending this post about looking forward to 2013, I want to ask you to think about the chances you are able to give to others next year. It may even be a chance that you need to give yourself. That’s what’s rare. That’s what counts.

Thank you.

Follow me on Twitter @KevinCate or Like Us on Facebook!

Follow me on Twitter @KevinCate

While I was in CFO Alex Sink’s administration, she supported my efforts to support small businesses, restaurants, hotels, and subsequently jobs by adding visitflorida.com to the bottom of the license plate in place of 1992-looking “MyFlorida.com” or “The Sunshine State.”

This call-to-action would be seen hundreds of millions of times a year. However, it failed to gain traction. But a few days ago, the Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles announced that they were redesigning the license plate and were allowing the public to vote on four options.

And they are awful. The backlash on social media was swift and overwhelmingly negative.

That afternoon, I called my friend Sean Hartman at SQUAREFACTOR and told him that the state needed our help, ASAP. We put our heads together and donated this updated design to the state:

Part of the initial resistance to a new license plate was the agricultural community’s fear that a redesign would exclude the orange, which is why we included the iconic Florida orange in our design. We also included rays of sun to symbolize our sunshine state motto. It was also important to the state to keep the alphanumerics black, flat, and easy for red light cameras to pick up, so we adjusted our original concept to make the alphanumerics as easy to pick up as if they were on a pure white background. Most importantly, we added visitflorida.com to the bottom.

I emailed the Department as soon as we saw the current options, and finally received a response the next day around 5 PM, after the media and social media embraced our new design (here, here, here, etc.). They informed me that there was a “design committee” and that they were unable to accept any private sector help with the plates, free or not.

Around that same time, new VISTT FLORIDA CEO Will Seccombe tweeted this:

It’s clear that despite the state inviting the public to vote on the new designs, they are not interested in feedback. Just take a look at the comments from articles on the original design.

I’m hoping that the business community and Governor Scott can change their mind.

What do you think?

Follow me on Twitter @KevinCate

We are learning a lot from last Tuesday, and while President Obama won’t be on the ballot in 2014, here is my first key litmus test based on the results:

Can You Energize Miami-Dade (and Hispanic Voters)? If not, don’t apply.

Miami-Dade makes up about 10% of registered voters and is trending more and more blue.

In 2010, Alex Sink took 56.21% of Miami-Dade, banking 69,720 votes. Last Tuesday, Barack Obama took 61.57%, for a total margin of 207,259. If you assume non-Presidential year turnout, at 61.57%, Sink could have banked 26,208 more votes in 2010. Remember; Sink only lost by 61,550 statewide and it’s not like Rick Scott was doing anything to earn the support of Hispanics in Florida.

In 2014, Democrats need a nominee that will match or exceed 61% in Miami-Dade.

Obviously, Hispanic voters have a large part to do with these margins. Exit polls show that statewide, 62% of Hispanic voters voted for President Obama (57% in 2008) and made up 17% of the electorate (14% in 2008).

It’s not just Miami-Dade, but that’s where the margins can run up numbers the fastest. Orange County is obviously important and increasingly areas like Osceola County.

Statewide, the nominee will have to maintain margins in Palm Beach, Broward, continue successful neutralization of Duval and slight margins in Hillsborough. But my first question to a potential 2014 candidate will still be: how are you going to energize Miami-Dade and Hispanic voters? If they can’t answer, they can’t win.

Follow me on Twitter at @KevinCate

This all begs the question: how much cash would it cost to replicate 90 minutes of uninterrupted political earned media?

There are a few ways to calculate earned media, but it’s hard. My friend Justin Sayfie sparked a conversation on Twitter with an initial estimate based on the cost of Super Bowl advertising. If you follow that formula, $7 million per minute (111 million viewers) works out to be about $380 million worth of earned media.

But that’s not the whole story. The debate aired on four broadcast and seven cable channels. If you use averages, based on Nielsen and SQAD, the average primetime national broadcast ad averages around $110,000 per 30 seconds, and (generously) cable averages around $30,000 per seconds.

That adds up to about $117 million.

However, we are trying to replicate 90 minutes of direct, uninterrupted voter contact, and we actually do have a good measurement tool. In 2008, the Obama campaign aired a 30-minute special that aired on two national broadcast networks and several cable networks. That program is estimated to have cost around $3.5 million for an audience of about 30 million— the power of a huge buy vs. 30-second advertisements.

Patrick Ruffini did the math and that brings us to about $35 million.

So around $35 million could replicate 90-minutes of uninterrupted TV time to 67 million viewers, but it still wouldn’t have the same effect as the debate. Because, just like the Super Bowl, you have hoards of earned media both pre and post debate that likely dwarfs the actual broadcast cash value. Add in all of the social interaction, and the cash value balloons.

What was the cash value? About $40 million. What was the actual value? 5 points.

Follow me on Twitter at @KevinCate

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