If there is one thing we can all agree on when it comes to the recent presidential election, it’s that it was like no other. Whether you were elated or dismayed at the final results, there’s no doubt that we had a ringside seat for some crazy and inventive marketing strategies.

Strip away the importance of the outcome, the rancor of the debates and even the specifics of the messaging, and underneath all of that is a marketing and sales effort, plain and simple.

Look at the elements:

• Two organizations that are vying for our attention and our currency.
• Each wants us to feel an acute enough need that we choose to make a purchase as opposed to avoiding the store altogether.
• When we go to make the purchase, they want their product to be the one that we believe will meet our needs.
• There’s not only their own marketing to contend with, but they know they need to overcome their competitor’s messaging and the peer pressure and consumer reviews that we’re exposed to as well.

What can we learn from this four-year master class in marketing?

Understand how the purchase is being made: One of the most remarkable aspects of this election was how close the final votes were in many of the states. Clinton won the popular vote, but in this marketing contest, that’s not how the winner is decided. Interestingly, the Democrats have won the popular vote in six of the last seven elections but lost the Electoral College in two of them. Your marketing strategy has to take into account the sales journey, and it’s rarely a straight line or free from outside influences.

Invite your audience to align your core message with their own life: “Make America Great Again” allows the audience to define what great means in the context of their own life. It immediately makes it personal. Clinton’s “Stronger Together” was more descriptive than open for interpretation.

They don’t want to see the labor, they just want to see the baby: No matter which candidate you supported, it’s hard to dispute that Clinton was more qualified in terms of political experience and an understanding of the process of being president. The years of experience meant her answers were often more complicated, and ultimately many of the undecideds were drawn to Trump’s sizzle over Clinton’s steak.

What you say on social media can haunt you: There’s no doubt that Trump’s tweets gave his campaign team indigestion. Rather than spending time and money on driving his messaging, they got caught up in controlling public opinion around his social media activity. Not only will your audience remember your social media blunders, but they will also share those blunders with their own social circle.  

Controversy creates conversation: If there’s one thing Trump mastered during the campaign, it was the art of getting media coverage. The more outrageous his remarks or ideas, the more the media ate it up and gave him millions of dollars of free exposure. His media spend was less than half of what Clinton spent, but the truth is, his earned media exposure allowed him to dominate the media’s attention and time.

I’m not suggesting that any one of these marketing truths brought about the election outcome. Much like our own sales funnel, the election was a lot more layered and complicated than that because the needs and wants of the audience were so varied and incredibly personal.

Every buying decision is based on emotion, and an election is no exception. No matter how you voted, there’s no question that this election stirred up a lot of emotions for the voting public. Triggering those emotions and leveraging them to get people to take action is the essence of smart marketing.