Facebook is proving to be an increasingly useful tool for politicians. A campaign was conducted recently by SocialCode to measure how many times a potential presidential candidate was “liked”, where the voters were from, and what issues are important to them. Using this information, SocialCode was able to come up with a ranking by importance of issue for potential candidates. They were also able to identify the popularity of potential candidates in a given state. This will prove to be extremely useful in predicting the outcome of the elections. Candidates can use Facebook as a mechanism for measuring where they should focus their energy in the campaign. This is yet another way that social media may prove to have a real effect on world politics.
http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=152236
2 comments:
Elaborating on the use of "Likes" on Facebook for other purposes, while I was working in marketing and Sponsorship sales with an NBA Team, we were starting to use online metrics as sales tools.
I noticed while I was there in Charlotte that the radio station I used to listen to made constant announcements on the air about the number of "Likes" they had and the thresholds they were trying to surpass.
It took me a while to make the connection that you can actually increase corporate sales in many industries by adding an element such as Facebook following solely legitimized on the number of "Likes" that your team, or radio station, or company has on their Facebook page.
On sales decks, at least in Corporate Partnerships with the Bobcats in Charlotte, we had to summarize both qualitatively and quantitatively the # of impressions that the different channels of communication and touchpoints could give an advertiser to the consumer. If a "liking" consumer from FB gets exposure to advertisers of the originating entity, FB "liking" would thus be a legitimate and pretty relevant marketing metric.
While reading this post, and although this is a totaly different angle I couldn't help but think of the Anthony Weiner scandal and how does it or will it effect the use of social media by politicians.
Such cases obviously have some impact on the credibility of these politicains. Also, it might affect how the public might view not only their actions but the consequences of following or 'liking' politicians on social networks.
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