Performance analysis and scientific mapping of the literature on political marketing and brand: a systematic review

This paper aims to examine the scholarship of political marketing and brand. The systematic literature review method was conducted to assess the emergence and influence of the evolving scholarship by performance analysis and scientific mapping. Whereas performance analysis summarizes publication trends and most influential papers based on citation counts at the micro level, scientific mapping examines keywords, papers, and themes with network analysis for interwoven relationships at the meso and macro levels. The results revealed the rising dominance of the voter-consumer paradigm to view voters and political campaigns as political brand consumers and branding strategies. This research has identified the lack of promotion and engagement for social goods through political marketing in scholarship, which threatens the important role of civic society: the collective pursuit of social good. Theoretical implications were drawn from the critical marketing perspective by examining the risks, consequences, and remedies of the voter-consumer paradigm. Practitioners may develop strategies for working with emerging technologies for political brands, as exhibited in Truth Social’s engagement and political polarization. Future researchers gain insights from the research propositions based on the Theory-Context-Characteristics-Methodology (TCCM) framework. They may conduct an empirical investigation with longitudinal research from the processual perspective with big data to expand empirical contexts. This approach helps enhance the representation of social issues on diversity, equity, and inclusion and advises implementing evidence-driven strategies to co-create political brands.