Crow and Conversations

Wow. Congrats o the HRC campaign, and kudos to her NH field team. Though I am not eating quite as much crow as the national media, I do want to defend a few earlier thoughts given her revival.

The Obama (and to a lesser extent Paul and Edwards) campaign's use of social media in its broader sense is revolutionary and highly effective. As our attention continues to be fragmented, it is critical
for campaigns to get involved in the conversation. Hillary's demeanor over the past few days has lent itself well to this new dynamic. The format of the Facebook debate Saturday night of a sit-down conversation also fit this new paradigm, though we can go further. And of course, her moment of vulnerability Monday helped the voters of New Hampshire see past the spin and rhetoric to the person underneath.

Simple, one-to-many messages no longer have enough bite to cut through. Inciting, fostering and otherwise engaging in the conversation drives significant impact. Word-of-mouth discussion has always been powerful, but the tools of digital social media make it efficient. Power + efficiency = an effective tool for political campaigning.

There is still going to be a flood of opportunity to continue to hone these new tools over the coming months, mistakes will be made, but I still believe a tipping point is at hand, if not for Obama for social media.

What it will mean...

Nah, I'm not talking about the new page of non-partisanship in American politics the hope that we finally have a real, honest candidate for president. I'm not even talking about the whole racial thing. What I'm talking about is what another win by Obama on Tuesday will mean for political web strategy. (Not that these are unimportant, but I'm trying to focus here...)

There is going to be a huge need within American politics for strategic tech-thinkers over the coming weeks and months.

I am not talking about web development. I am talking about strategy - having a member of the senior strategic team on board that can understands and knows how to reach out to blogs, social media, online communities, etc., on par with the media strategist. Assuming things go as they are heading and New Hampshire validates much of what happened in Iowa (including the larger youth vote), political web strategy will finally get bumped up a few notches in importance for all those statewide, Congressional, and even local races underway. The real trouble is that this stuff is so new, most of the entrenched folks to date don't have the background and experience to play at the level needed. And those with the expertise are going to be difficult to find.

The entrenched web developers will get the initial nod, but they will have to be able to stand up to the media egomaniacs that have had the controls for decades. The bulk of the folks that have managed political websites over the past few cycles don't have the chops, nor the vision to sit at the big table. Of course, there are some that will fill the void well. But, an opportunity exists for the strategic tech-thinkers outside of politics already tinkering with new ideas of how to communicate, reach out, organize, and otherwise campaign, to be a part of something real.

So, I would like to open up this blog, myself and my Rolodex to begin helping the aspiring politicos out there in tech-land to come forth and be a part of the revolution. Leave a comment or send me an email with your tech credentials, and a bit about your strategic vision for a campaign.

I am trying to get a seat at the table myself, but my sense is that Obama may open more doors than one...

The Message of Social Media

From Jake McKee:

"With the Iowa wins by my man Barack Obama as well as Mike Huckabee, I wonder if something significant hasn’t taken place. Has the mindset that consumers have bought into regarding how they expect companies to treat them and interact with them taken hold in a larger worldly context?

Read what Andrew Sullivan, political blogger, had to say about these two candidates and their wins:

Look at their names: Huckabee and Obama. Both came from nowhere - from Arkansas and Hawaii. Both campaigned as human beings, not programmed campaign robots with messages honed in focus groups. Both faced powerful and monied establishments in both parties. And both are running two variants on the same message: change, uniting America again, saying goodbye to the bitterness of the polarized past, representing ordinary voters against the professionals. Neither has been ground down by long experience, but neither is a neophyte.

Notice the similarities in this statement to the messages of social media, citizen marketing, and customer collaboration which seek to bring humanity back into marketing and business?"

Couldn't have said it better myself...

The Technology Tipping Point?

What a night! Obama is taking what Dean did in 2004 even further. To use a few overused metaphors, it is as if he, like Dean, amassed a following from a long tail of latent political activists - enough to surmount the tipping point for success. Obama certainly has done a better job this time around, reaching further up the tail towards the established manner of going about running a campaign. Though the small, grassroots effort is at his core, he has also amassed plenty of traditional backers (see this WashPost story comparing foreign policy teams.) It remains o be seen if this grassroots massing can continue to overcome the traditional, iron-clad organization Clinton has amassed in later states...

Also, those under 29 made up 22% of the turnout last night, as compared to 17% in 2004. And those 30-44 made up another 18%, versus 15% in '04. Obama won 57% of those under 29 years of age and 42% of those 30-44. Given how much of an advantage his campaign has among younger voters and the prevailing understanding that young people are more adept at the new age of technology, the role of technology in this election is unprecedented and may actually usher in a non-establishment candidate. Obama is not doing everything right (as I point out here), but he is certainly doing better than the others...

Investing Resources

Below is an interesting graphic that illustrates the impact / reach of campaign websites within the activist community, via DailyKos. I know the DK readership is not exactly representative of the electorate as a whole, but technology is certainly empowering them to be a vocal bloc to be reckoned with. My question is what are the campaigns doing to reach out to this audience? Each of the majors have spent a ton of cash and (more importantly) a ton of time on their websites. Yet, they continue to play a limited role in actually helping their candidacy, merely speaking to their base of core supporters.
























At what point will the campaigns figure out how to use their site to reach out to non-supporters, activists, and other influencers?

Horse Race vs. Issues

ABC News partnered with Facebook to provide content via the US Politics application. Old news, I know. The content is interesting - ABC has off-air reporters traveling with each of the campaigns (I believe other networks do this as well). The reporters then blog their happenings via the application, share photos, video, etc. Users are able to follow their favorite reporter / candidate - essentially becoming their friend. However, the content thus far does nothing to improve the discourse and continues to shine the light on the horse race. Given these new tools and resources, why is the media still stuck within the guardrails of traditional media?

The networks are spending tens of thousands of dollars on initiatives such as these, but do we really care that Richardson spoke in Indianola this morning? Is that even entertaining? As the social media revolution continues, democracy is returning to the hands of the people. We are no longer restricted to sound-bite journalism and 30-second TV commercials. Entertainment certainly still sells, but so does valuable information. When will traditional media step up to at least attempt to deliver the cornerstone of journalism: objective information.

Yeah Obama! Shame Obama...

Congratulations to the Obama folks for actually creating a useful tool within Facebook! Shame on you for burying it inside your weak attempt at a Digg clone. The tool allows you to identify and reach out to your friends that live in Iowa, to urge them to Caucus tomorrow - politics 101. However, as far as I can tell, you can only get to the tool through a link either on the existing Obama app home page (which only had 867 visitors within the past 24 hours) or from the update sent to the 36 K people that installed the app. Nothing on his website, no blog posts, not even a posting on his Facebook page. Way to drive the traffic! Given his popularity within the Facebook community, driving simple actions such as these are ripe opportunities, yet you have to drive the traffic...

And what about New Hampshire and the other states? Are they waiting to tweak it for those? I am not all that technical, but assuming the code is not complete chaos, this should be easily replicated for other states. Nothing like sticking your toe in the water as we get down to the wire...

See TechPresident's coverage here. If you are on Facebook and have already added the Obama app, check it out and urge your Iowan friends to participate tomorrow evening...