Originally published on Substack on December 9, 2025.
This article discusses research on conversational AI, earlier texting experiments and the author’s reported observations from conversational technology in use. It brings those different kinds of evidence together in a December 2025 discussion of persuasion measurement, with the full argument and its supporting material available in the original publication.
This is a striking shift from broadcast persuasion to dialogue as the core unit of influence. The combination of peer-reviewed evidence and real deployment data makes it hard to dismiss this as hype. Measuring movement instead of impressions feels like the real breakthrough here, and it raises serious questions about how campaigns, platforms, and governance should adapt going forward.
Exactly, and this is where it gets uncomfortable for campaigns.
We still have consultants reflexively pouring money into TV (and even worse, mail) because that’s how budgets, fees, and habits were built. But impressions and mail drops are blunt instruments compared to what conversational systems can now do.
When you can measure actual movement during an interaction, continuing to treat exposure as the goal starts to look like malpractice, especially for the GOP, which doesn’t win by outspending but by persuading efficiently.
The science and the field data both suggest the same thing: the Right has to adapt faster, or we’ll keep losing ground while paying top dollar for diminishing returns.
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