Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s presidential campaign is aiming to spend heavily on TV ads in the run up to the election and will also utilise 60-second spots, all of which stands in contrast to the Trump campaign.

In money terms, Biden’s team said it will spend $220 million on TV over the next three months, with a further $60 million being earmarked for digital ads, the Financial Times reported, including on video streaming services, podcasting platforms, online and mobile gaming sites and website banner advertising slots.

The Trump campaign is reported to have $151 million in ads reserved through to Election Day; and it continues to make use of Facebook, which, The Atlantic noted recently, has “wired a machine into electoral decision making”.

“Trump spends tens of millions of dollars on Facebook marketing,” wrote Ian Bogost and Alexis C. Madrigal. “But his boring, forgettable ads work so well because his campaign has been willing to cede control to Facebook’s ad-buying machinery, and then to cultivate the results into even more Facebook ads.”

That has been a winning formula. Biden’s approach seems likely to be more conventional, with national ads around sporting and news events and ads targeted at particular ethnic groups. And many of these will take the form of 60-second slots, according to aides (Advertising Analytics data shows 36% of the Biden campaign ad spend so far has been on such longer form ads compared to 1% of the Trump campaign’s).

Biden will also speak in his own voice about the issues facing the country, Bloomberg Quint reported.

“A key component of our message that differentiates us from the president is that we are speaking clearly and directly to the crisis at hand,” explained chief strategist Mike Donilon. “It goes to the issue of leadership and a reassuring presence.”

Sourced from Financial Times, Bloomberg Quint, The Atlantic; additional content by WARC staff