With surveys favouring her suave presidential poll rival, Indonesia's Megawati Sukarnoputri has sought to shed an aloof and uncaring image and rebrand herself as a go-getting and attentive leader.
Daughter of the country's founding president Sukarno, Megawati has enjoyed strong popularity in the past, relying on the support of so-called "little people", won over by her promises of reform.
But legislative polls in April saw Megawati's Indonesian Democratic Party of Struggle suffer heavy losses against the victorious Golkar party.
And a first round presidential vote in which she finished second to her former security minister Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono seems to have acted as a wake up call for the president ahead of a September 20 final voting round.
Critics claim voters have been turned off by Megawati's image as a dour and distant leader who prefers the dank corridors of power to public appearances and media interviews.
"There was criticism that Megawati was lacking in public communications skills. This has been enough to undermine her popularity and one of the main reasons why she and her party have not been performing too well," said political analyst Dewi Fortuna Anwar of the Habibie Centre think tank.
Faced by a media-savvy rival with a common touch and a penchant for crooning in what opinion polls say has largely become a popularity contest, the president has undergone a remarkable makeover which has seen her leap into the spotlight.
Apparently no longer wary of her public, she has spent more time outside the capital in the past few months than she has during her entire three-year tenure, hobnobbing with poor farmers, fishermen and clerics while liberally doling out assistance and funding.
In the second half of August alone she visited 22 towns and cities across the Indonesia's sprawling archipelago, including a high profile visit to the troubled region of Aceh, where government troops are fighting to crush rebels.
Amid televised pomp and pageantry the president visited soldiers engaged in the 16-month Aceh military operation during a flying visit to the staunchly Islamic province where she also doled out Korans for Islamic schools.
In another deft touch, Megawati was visibly swift in cutting short a trip to Brunei in the wake of a deadly bomb attack on the Australian embassy in Jakarta to visit victims and reassure her country.
Despite Megawati's unquestionable transformation, those orchestrating her campaign deny she has changed tactics.
"This is entirely normal for an incumbent president, to show that his or her government has contributed to the progress and to the development of the country," said Cornelis Lay, a political scientist with the Megawati Centre.
According to the Habibie Centre's Anwar, while the sudden flurry of activity may not be unusual for a political candidate, many voters were likely to view it with cynicism.
"It comes across as a public relations exercise, not something genuine that comes deep from the heart. It looks as an image-building exercise for Mega and not something undertaken for the sake of national interest," she said.