Social Times - Latest Comments in Should Politicians Use Social Media?

Re: Should Politicians Use Social Media?

Anthony LaFauce — Thu, 29 May 2008 12:25:12 -0000

These are some great comments guys. I am interested in what Eric said about time lag in the metrics of social media and the amount of time needed to invest in it. I find time is a major reason people fail to adopt social media.

Re: Should Politicians Use Social Media?

Martin Edic — Thu, 29 May 2008 11:53:33 -0000

I sit on the monitoring side of social media (we're a social media monitoring service) and reputation is a major issue with politics in social media. If you're going to campaign in SM (actually even if you're not!) you should also monitor what people are saying so you can assess the sentiment and then participate rather than pitch or sway. Social media picks up and spreads opinion a lot faster than conventional online media so monitoring provides an early notification of good or bad trends around a reputation. This 'real time' aspect means that simply setting up Google Alerts is not enough because they're not providing real time results from things like Twitter or the social networks- they have index which has a time lag.

Re: Should Politicians Use Social Media?

Henri — Thu, 29 May 2008 09:44:17 -0000

good post Nick. I'm involved in a local campaign here in dc and I often wonder how much we should rely on social media. One thing that you don't talk about in your post is the man power it takes keep up with social media and keep it fresh and interesting.

Another thing is that candidate don't have as much time as they used to, especially at the local level. I would like to hear what you would suggest on how they can better use social media.

Re: Should Politicians Use Social Media?

Sean — Wed, 28 May 2008 19:08:20 -0000

I would suggest that educating and swaying votes are probably one and the same. Apathy aside, people generally vote for candidates who share similar values and ideals. If I don't have access to someone's platform, there isn't a chance for me to agree or disagree with it.

So your best chance to make me identify with your platform is to bring your message to me in the places I frequent (YouTube, Facebook, Blogs, etc.) I think you sway my vote by educating me.

Sadly, I think the average voter is much more superficial than basing their vote on where the candidates stand on the issues.

Great post, I really enjoyed it. Very thought provoking.