Huge marketing strategist lead Josh Seifert returns with his monthly contribution to this here site. The headline should give you the basic premise of our scribe’s latest entry, in which he reveals who really won out in the wake of the 2012 election. Take it away, sir.

Living in New York, I thankfully did not have to endure the billions of dollars spent on political advertising this election myself, but now that the results are in and our feeds on Facebook and Twitter are returning to their normal political apathy, it’s probably worth exploring what we as marketers learned from politics this year.

Losing a United States Senate race in a conservative state as a Republican used to be the hardest thing in the world, but as Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock learned, the potential impact of saying something stupid is even greater than it used to be. Inflammatory gaffes now extend far beyond the news cycle with social media and instant memeification reaching people who have long since tuned out traditional media coverage. While brands rarely have occasion to address topics as controversial as politicians do, their offline behaviors still have significant potential to be amplified and shared for long periods of time far beyond the incident. Just ask FedEx executives if this old package delivery YouTube video is what they want people finding and watching nearly a year later. Fortunately for brands, this can be merely damaging and not wholly destructive.

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