The media loves writing stories on social media usage in politics. Whether this is because social media is constantly evolving or whether it’s because it’s simply the “shiny thing” to talk about right now, the stories seem to flow like wine. The issue with many of these stories is that they remain centered only on the public number of supporters for candidates and rarely showcase how a campaign is using a specific platform or how their fans are interacting.

Take this recent story by Laura Phelps of the Medill News Service in which she ends the article with a descending list of candidates for President, ordered by their total number of “likes” on Facebook.

I’d like to offer up a different and better metric: the percentage of people “talking about” each candidate. The “taking about” number was released by Facebook earlier this year (2011) and is a cumulative number, updated daily, of people who have interacted with a page. Page interactions include liking a status, commenting on a status, tagging a page in a photo, writing on a pages wall, and various other actions.

This metric showcases the virility of a campaign on Facebook. If we use this metric and divide the total number of “likes”, the candidate in descending order by the largest percentage “talking about” would look like this:

This table stands in stark contrast with the ones the media normally promotes, ones only focused on total public numbers of “likes”. As the table above shows, yes, Mitt Romney and Barack Obama are leading the field in terms of “likes” but there are significantly less people interacting with their pages than candidates with less “likes.” This statistic is amazing: Mitt Romney has 33x more “likes” than Rick Santorum, yet only has 5x more people “talking about” his page.

Facebook is set up to reward interactive pages. Its unique EdgeRank system does this by promoting content that is interactive more than stale content. Because of this system, it would technically be possible for content posted on Rick Santorum, Jon Huntsman, or Rick Perry’s page to be seen by more people than something posted on Michele Bachmann or Mitt Romney’s page, despite them having significantly more “likes.” Let me repeat that so folks can grasp the concept: despite Mitt Romney having over 1 million “likes” on Facebook, a piece of content posted to Rick Santorum’s 36,000 “likes” could technically be seen by more people.

Even Ron Paul who usually gets a lot of props for being a web-friendly candidate has less people “talking about” his page than four of his Republican opponents.
As the chart above showcases, it’s obviously is harder to bring about engagements with pages the larger they become. My best guess as to why some of the smaller pages have a larger “talking about” number would be because those pages are made up of mostly organic “likes.” These are people who are rapid supporters who sought out these candidates on their own on Facebook and opted to “like” a page without needing to be advertised to.

As Facebook has continued to morph itself into an ad-centered model, it has become harder to break through the clutter and reach fans with creative and engaging content. Facebook is not only rewarding interactions on pages but they are in a way punishing non-interactive pages by not showing content to users who haven’t interacted with a page in a while. Facebook’s solution to fix this: advertise!

When the story about Facebook and the 2012 cycle is written, it shouldn’t be about shear total public numbers. Barack Obama may dwarf every Republican on Facebook in terms of total number of “likes” but less than 1.2% of his fans are “talking about” his page and interacting with his content. Obama’s Facebook page is truly a paper tiger, one that has a lot of bark but very little bite. He ran an incredibly impressive social media operation in 2008 but Republicans have caught up and in some ways are doing better on Facebook and Twitter. Reporters would be wise to read up on Facebook’s EdgeRank algorithm before writing stories on his campaign’s social media domination. When that story is written, it is the Republicans who dwarf Obama.

Vincent Harris serves as Founder and CEO at Harris Media, a national media and communications firm based in Austin, Texas (www.harrismediallc.com). He ran online operations for Governors McDonnell and Scott, and currently is working with the Rick Perry Presidential campaign.

Over 156 million Americans have Facebook accounts so it seems natural that large government agencies would be on Facebook as well- right? With recent studies showing website traffic declining as Facebook traffic increases, it makes analytical sense for the Government to flock to the mammoth social network in an effort to reach constituents and foster participation. I recently wrote a paper on the 10 largest bureaucratic institutions use of Facebook and wanted to share some of the results.

Since public numbers on Facebook fluctuate daily, the data set used was pulled on the evening of November 25^th, 2011. The agencies discussed could be broken down into two distinct categories: military branches, and other agencies. The three branches of the military (Amy, Navy, and Air Force) ran their Facebook pages very differently than the other agencies. Everything from their larger numbers of “likes”, to their uniquely developed Facebook tabs, showcased much more of a self-marketing mentality than the other agencies did.

Chart A compares the size of the agencies in 2008 according to the Department of Labor and their current Facebook audience:

Chart A

With a recent Webtrends study showcasing the cost of acquiring a “like” through advertising at $1.07, it seems some of these agencies spent a pretty penny in marketing themselves. Table 1 reflects the ten pages broken down by pages with similar numbers. The nature of Facebook advertising as a means to gain “likes” seems to coincide with the agencies respective missions.

Table 1

The best determinant of whether an agency was utilizing Facebook successfully seemed to be the agency’s mission. The military agencies have a tangible need that the others do not: recruitment. All bureaucracies need new employees but the Army, Navy, and Air Force are bent on recruiting active duty soldiers to train and send into battle. Many of these recruits are young, which matches the overall demographics of Facebook, so it fits perfectly. The large discrepancy in size of the Facebook page of the Army with over 1,000,000 “likes” to that of the Department of Interior with barely 4,000 “likes” is truly staggering.

Few agencies affect Americans on a daily basis, as does the Department of Homeland Security. Whether it is airport security or security threats, the agency has a very important role in society. Despite its role, the agency has only been able to garner around 30,000 “likes”, roughly the size of Juneau, Alaska according to recent population estimates. This is just sad.

Every one of these bureaucracies certainly has an expansive, skilled communications staff. They also likely have lower level staff that answers e-mails, letters, and faxes. It is curious then that every comment left on all 10 Facebook pages went unanswered. This occurred even when direct, relevant questions are asked of the agency. This certainly does not foster participation- one could even argue it hinders it. Why create a forum for discussion if there is no tangible discussion? Answering comments takes time, but very few of the other communications mediums with these agencies are public which would seem to lend itself to a need for two-way communicating so as not to seem like avoiding people.

All ten of the largest American bureaucracies have checked the necessary box of setting up a Facebook page but their individual uses of the social network varies tremendously. Social media will not be going away anytime soon and the recent Arab Spring revolutions have even put more emphasis on the need for Governments across the world to engage their citizens via these important mediums. Hopefully as Government continues to evolve in its usage of digital mediums to reach citizens it will make a determination on whether it wants to actually engage fully in the chosen platforms or simply dip its toe in the water. So far it seems apparent that unless there is a compelling self-interested reason for a robust Facebook operation to exist, the agencies have better things to do.

The full paper can be read here.

As we move toward the complete ubiquity of social media use by campaigns, simply having a Twitter or Facebook no longer provides a campaign with a competitive edge.  Campaigns must strive to be innovative in the ways in which they use social media, or at least adopt the innovations that others have pioneered.  For this reason, it is worthwhile to examine some social media best practices.  Today, we will examine the Facebook photostrip.

The photostrip is the string of five photos that runs across the top of a Facebook page.  By default, the photostrip simply displays the last five photos that have been posted to a page.  While this is acceptable to most users, this visual property on Facebook is too valuable for us to not try and find a better, more interactive use of the photostrip.

First, let’s take a look at an example of an underutilized photostrip:

You can see that this photostrip is a collection of random images that have been posted to the associated Facebook page.  Users cannot see the complete post that was originally associated with a specific image until they click on the image itself.  Without the context or call to action that was posted with them, the images lose meaning, and users are likely to quickly move past the photostrip without taking action.

The best use of the photostrip involves the creation of action buttons, which are simple images that graphically represent the action that the user will take when clicking.  Examples of action buttons include: Visit Website, Follow on Twitter, Contact, etc.  Below is an excellent example of action buttons being used to get the most out of the photostrip:

The buttons themselves describe the action to be taken, so users are likely to click and take action.  Once clicked, the button will open the original post, which will explain the action and contain the necessary link:

To set up your photostrip, simply create five images with the actions you want to use.  When you upload them to your page, they will automatically be displayed on the photostrip.  Note that the order in which you upload them will determine the order in which they are displayed.  The last thing you need to consider when using action buttons is that any subsequent images you upload will overwrite your action buttons in the photostrip.  To fix this, simply hover over the image you wish to remove from the photostrip and click the small “x” in the upper-right hand corner:

Setting up action buttons is an easy and effective way to make better use of the valuable real estate that the photostrip takes up on your page.  This tip will help to increase interaction on your page and ensure you are using your Facebook to its full potential.

Michigan National Committeeman and techie Saul Anuzis wrote a post yesterday decimating Google as not a friend of conservatives and Republicans in Washington. As a former Google skeptic, I see some of what Saul is saying but he misses broader points……

A large part of the Republican party and conservative value system reflects the ideals of American capitalism and American exceptionalism. With the possible exception of Facebook, Google stands tallest among businesses in the past few years. Google products span the globe and their reach is almost immeasurable. It is the success of Google and Google’s products in many ways that help raise awareness for the United States, Democracy, and the democratic process. I am writing this blog post from Egypt, where I’ve heard that Google will is potentially working on creating a website that will assist Egyptians on finding their polling location during next month’s first free and fair parliamentary elections. How more pro-Democracy can you be? As Republicans and conservatives I’d hope we could acknowledge the success of Google as a company and revel in its power in the global marketplace.

Wisely following in the footsteps of Facebook which recently hired notable Republicans onto its staff, Google has hired up experienced Republican consultants to bolster relationships between campaigns and elected Republican officials and Google’s advertising/marketing department. This will go a long way in fixing some of the perceived distance by the company and the conservative movement.

Even before these hires, Google’s non-political staff has done a fantastic job of reaching out to Republican campaigns and elected officials. Not only does Google provide help in terms of information, time, and resources to conservative campaigns across the country, but they often go out of their way to ensure Republicans are being given every opportunity possible to utilize their platform. The information and time Google provides to campaigns is priceless. Frequently members of Google’s staff are e-mailing back after hours to approve last minute campaign ads and Google staffers spend countless hours optimizing existing Republican ad campaigns to meet client demands. They’re also doing a great job of making the speaking circuit. Google’s Andrew Roos may be a Democrat but over the past 2 years he has done a remarkable job of bridging the gap with Republicans and being incredibly helpful to multiple Republican new media firms and campaigns.

I can only imagine that many of the people attacking Google publicly over the past couple of months are ignorant of the huge steps the company is taking to be helpful to conservatives and change the public misconceptions of themselves. A recent attack by Presidential candidate Rick Santorum on the company to me showcases the desperation of a flailing Presidential campaign . How can we as Republicans advocate for smaller government and less intervention in corporate affairs but then at the same time publicly advocate for a company to artificially change its search engine result rankings?

The Santorum issue showcases a bigger issue for conservatives than Google. We (conservatives) have come leaps and bounds from 2008 but the liberal netroots are still more centrally organized and willing to band together around a cause. A prime example: They have one main successful online donation portal, while the web is littered with tombstones of failed conservative ActBlue copycats. The Santorum issue also highlights this divide.

Before we take the easy way out and blame Google and their “liberal lobbying machine” for all of our problems, I suggest we step back and acknowledge the reality: Google is working with Republicans just as hard as they’re working with Democrats. As Republicans, how can we argue with that?

*Google did not ask me to write this article nor have I ever been nor currently am paid by Google.

Yesterday, Mark Zuckerberg revealed a monumental shift in the way Facebook will be used by its (now over 800 million) users at their annual developer conference in San Francisco. The new feature is named Timeline.

The platform will allow users to create a new lifestream on Facebook dating back to the day they were born. They can highlight important events, activities, and of course continue to post their daily check-ins and food consumptions. Another release is an expansion to Facebook’s open graph. This will allow connections to be made on anything. For example, “Vincent watched the Presidential Debate” or “Wesley attended Pub Politics.” No longer are we held captive by just liking something, but now you are able to “connect anything, anywhere.” The shift for Facebook is one that will continue to their dominance as a communications platform for the next few years while at the same time giving me yet something else I need to explain to my Mom how to use.

What does it mean thought for us in the political arena? With the expansion of the open graph we are now able to provide more targeted advertising to users across Facebook. If we take our previous example used earlier, Governor Perry’s campaign in Texas can target more deeply those who attended or watched the presidential debate last night from Orlando (like Vincent did). Previously, the advertising team for Governor Perry would only be able to target those who showed interest in politics or even liked a political page they had targeted. The ability to now shape a very targeted message to a vert targeted set of people just became much easier. We are receiving more data about users that gives us the ability to shape messages that connect with people on a much more personal level. InsideFacebook.Com lets us know that we are going to have to be patient on getting this data though, as its going to be slow to roll out.

At first, only music, video, and readable content will feature these new feedback buttons, but Facebook’s VP of global marketing solutions David Fischer tell us the site is considering releasing more, including a “Want” button for products. Soon developers will be also be able to create their own feedback buttons. This could bring these new ad targeting opportunities to more industries such as ecommerce, consumer packaged good brands, and games.

What do you think of the new changes? Do you think there are other benefits for political campaigns/organizations or is it going to hurt them in the long run?

Good work Team Targeted Victory!

Voters Off The Grid: Whitepaper

- Wesley Donehue

This morning AdWeek released a piece with Ben Smith from Politico which discusses the dissemination of news content and the power of Twitter as tool to push out information.

I agree with Ben that Twitter is an incredibly powerful tool but I have some issue with the author (Dylan Byers) view of Twitter vs. Blogging.

It is mentioned in the article that Ben has more than 50,000 followers on Twitter which is compared to daily website traffic to his blog of 40,000 visits on a slow day. Comparing these two numbers really is apples and oranges. Many of the short tweets sent out on Twitter fly by users “All Friends” feeds and are never seen. Followers would need to be online at the moment a tweet was released, get tweets from Ben to their phone, or have a feed encompassing Ben’s tweets to view whenever they logged onto Twitter. Visitors coming to the website come from a variety of inbound links or visit organically. Either way, these are actual eyeballs on his content.

Twitter remains the tool of the hyper-engaged. In politics this would be “political elites” defined as activists, consultants, staff, candidates, and press. The average Republican voter is not on Twitter.

Candidates at all levels of elected office often ask whether it’s worth them spending time on Twitter. Will they win over voters? Will they be able to raise money?

The answer to both questions is yes…but on a much smaller scale then door knocking or e-mail fundraising appeals would respectively.

Conor Rogers from the Politicizer has a good piece written a couple of weeks ago on this topic where he says:

More Americans live in Texas than use Twitter – and as big as Texas is, there’s more people in Rhode Island than there are active Twitter users.

With a sizeable amount of website traffic continuing to come from searches on Google/Bing/Yahoo etc. , search engines continue to play a major role in sending people to websites. Yes, tweets are searchable but the major search engine’s predisposition is to link to websites/blogs instead of singular tweets.

There can be little doubt that Twitter is an important tool in politics. The platform has been used to break major news stories, assist in revolutions, and served as a platform for politicians such as Governor Sarah Palin to push message out. But blogs & websites are far from dead to the mainstream voter that determines actual electoral outcomes.

I have to congratulate Congresswoman Michelle Bachman and her supporters. They are playing the blogosphere and the mainstream media like a well-tuned violin, getting them to cover her “attack” on Governor Rick Perry.

At this point, if you are watching the GOP presidential race this early in the game, you have probably heard about this new ad produced by a Pro-Bachmann Super PAC out of North Carolina. Essentially, the “Keep Conservatives United” group is attacking Perry, claiming he isn’t a fiscal conservative and is not worthy of Tea Party or conservative support.

Have you seen this ad? No, not online via YouTube but actually viewed it on TV? No? Neither have I nor anyone else I’ve talked to in South Carolina. That is because the ad buys haven’t been big at all. Here in Columbia, SC where this ad is supposed to run to “hammer” Perry, only a little over $1,000 has been spent on ad buys at the largest local TV station.

That’s not even enough money to purchase one ad during the 6:00 news.

One ad is nothing anyways. Even if someone saw that ad, they would need to see it at least four more times for an effect to take place. Therefore, this ad is essentially a waste of time, won’t sway South Carolina voters at all, and shouldn’t garner any media attention.

Yet if you do a search on Google, you find article after article on this topic. What has Bachmann done here? Compared to previous election cycles that have relied on the Internet to get TV news coverage, she has essentially used the threat of broadcasting an advertisement on TV to get widespread distribution and coverage of the ad on the Internet.

The scarcity of the ad on TV may even make cable networks talk about it (and show it) during their programs. Ever hear about Apple’s successful “1984” advertisement that only ran once but received countless FREE replays by the media afterwards? This is essentially what Bachmann is doing with this ad, except now they have the Internet to spread their message as well.

At this rate, Bachmann will probably get more coverage of this ad on the Internet and in the mainstream media than the actual airtime on TV. That’s all free coverage, allowing her and her supporters to save money for future, more direct attacks against her opponents.

This may be a strategy others in the race will want to employ, especially whoever the GOP nominee is that will have to go up against Obama’s sure to be massive war chest.

- Wesley Donehue | @wesleydonehue

I am very excited to be blogging on this new site. This is definitely a website that’s needed because we all have so much to learn from one another. Sure, some of us are competing against one another for business. Some of us are even competing against each other on the campaign trail, but we are now discovering new territory, and we can all do amazing things when we tell each other what works and what doesn’t.

A quick introduction – I haven’t always been an Internet strategist. First, I was a political operative and political consultant. Our firm runs about 20 campaigns each election cycle. In 2006, I started realizing that the Internet wasn’t just “a fad,” as some people were calling it. As we now know, it is a fundamental shift in the way we communicate and activate. While my firm still runs the nuts and bolts of many campaigns, we now concentrate on Internet development and strategy. On this blog, I will be talking to you a lot about what works for us and what doesn’t. I’ll tell you about some big successes and some monumental screw ups. I hope I can help you a little bit.

Over the past weeks, I’ve been in quite the pissing contest with South Carolina Rep. Alan Clemmons. You see, because of my past work with the South Carolina Republican Party, I am a member of nearly every county party’s Facebook group in South Carolina. It’s been helpful knowing what’s going on with each county organization. However, over the past few weeks, I’ve been overwhelmed because every time Rep. Alan Clemmons is in the news, he posts the article on every single group’s wall. Today, I received about 15 different e-mails, within the span of 2 minutes, alerting me to Rep. Clemmons’ actions.

Folks, this is spam. Electronic communications without permission is spam. There is no difference in posting your news article on every single groups’ wall and sending e-mails without permission.

When it comes to e-mail spam, I have been known to be pretty liberal. Most online strategists would tell you not to use purchased lists at all. They argue that the open rate is so in credibly low. They are right. But I use purchased lists just like I use frequent donor lists. They are for prospecting purposes only. You do not e-mail these people every day. You e-mail them sporadically and occasionally with action items meant to get them onto your organic lists. A lot of strategists don’t even agree with that. I tell you that so that you can see how liberal I am when it comes to spam.

People join Facebook groups to get information about that specific group. I am a member of the Charleston County Republican Party Facebook page because I want to know what is going on in the Charleston County Republican Party. If I wanted to know what was going on with a specific campaign, I would join that campaign’s Facebook group. I am not a member of the Charleston County Republican Party Facebook group for every campaign to contact me. And now to think about it, there is nothing stopping every single candidate in the country from joining that Facebook group and spamming me all day long.

Some of Rep. Clemmons’ supporters started attacking me immediately, saying they want to hear from their representative, and that I’m just being shady and launching Internet attacks. Well, we all know that I’ve been caught in some shady Internet attacks; however, I often critique the Internet activity of both national and local campaigns. If these people want to hear from their representative, they should join that representative’s page. One person even said “Every representative is my representative.” If that’s the case, every state senator is that person’s state senator. Every congressman is that person’s congressman, and every US Senator is that person’s US Senator, not counting all the city and county council members. In South Carolina, this line of thinking opens up a Facebook group to 708 (every state rep, state senator, congressman and us senator) people that can spam us daily with nothing stopping them from spamming us multiple times each day.

If you are an elected official, a candidate or a campaign operative, and you want to reach out to people in a specific group, it is very easy to do so. All you have to do is post to a Facebook group’s wall asking them to join your group. In fact, nothing is stopping you from doing so multiple times. Now, don’t do it every single day or obviously more than a few times a week. But it’s not going to anger too many people if you ask politely every 2 to 3 weeks.

Joining a bunch of Facebook groups and broadcasting your message on each group is disingenuous, ineffective, rude, annoying and nothing more than spam. How would you feel if someone robocalled every single day? How would you feel if someone e-mailed you without your permission every single day? This practice is spam, and it must stop.

- Wesley Donehue | @wesleydonehue

In case you missed last week’s wonder video brought to you by Brent Barksdale and the folks at Jamestown…here it is again:

The Williams campaign did a fantastic job of capitalizing on a soundbite culture….one where attention spans are small and the number of web videos trying to copy Lucas Baiano’s T-Paw videos is plentiful. But the question I was asking myself as I watched the video was what the average campaign would think if approached with this idea. Would the average campaign manager, television consultant, pollster, or candidate break from their closely nit control of message in favor of such a video? I have my doubts and they might have good reason. There’s a fine line between being creative and going overboard…..but…. if a campaign can find the right message in a web video as the Williams campaign did than it is worth tons of eyeballs and potentially some money.

So props to Campaign Manager Colby Hale, Consultant Chris Homan, and the entire team for willing to take a risk on a web video which TRULY did “go viral.” The political space can learn a lesson that taking inexpensive risks that are “on message”….isn’t so risky after all.