my first playthrough ended in a tie (and then death), i focused really hard on trying to do the personal quests of everyone i got one from, locked down a decent number of votes but then didnt have time to fly around and meet everyone by the end.
second run i think i locked down a couple votes through quests, filled my cabinet (with mostly unhelpful advisors, statwise), and otherwise just focused on flying around, meeting everyone once and trying to get them to like me in the first meeting. was baffled that that was enough. im gathering a lot of people will just vote for you if they like you, which is handy. my stats were all over the place, but i did focus on empathy early since not knowing how people felt about me seemed like a big detriment in the first run.
i did also propose marriage to someones son and then married my childhood friends instead without going back to him to finalize it. oops.