How Scott Brown Used the Internet to Change the World of Politics

Tomorrow it will be the one year anniversary of Republitech and thus one year since Obama has been sworn in. It is rather fitting that today is the special election in Massachusetts to replace Senator Ted Kennedy. A Republican named Scott Brown looks like he might beat Democrat Martha Coakley in a state that has not sent a Republican to congress in well over a decade. While we won't know until later tonight who will win, it is an excellent lesson on how Republicans have an opportunity to seize the moment and leverage technology.

We have been hearing a lot about Brown's campaign. However, there are some things his campaign has been doing quite well that have not been highly publicized. The first comes from a CNN article that caught my eye - http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/01/15/first-on-the-ticker-gop-candidate-saturates-google-with-ads/. It was last month that I talked about the power of pay-per-click ads, specifically Google's tools (See post here). There are two things I want to highlight with Brown's Google ads. First, he started early. It got him name recognition, traffic to his website, and most critically donations in the early stage of his campaign. Second, his campaign clearly has spent time developing a pay-per-click strategy. They have a focused keyword strategy going after those searching for "Martha Coakley." Since Coakley is not buying advertising on Google at all, Brown has had free reign on both his name and his opponents. In other words, you are going to get pro-Brown ads no matter if you are searching for Brown or Coakley.

There is one "mistake" I noticed after doing some quick searches on Google. While the campaign is in Massachusetts, the race has become a national sensation. I could not find any ads on Google for either candidate. This is most likely because Brown has limited his ads to the state of Massachusetts (I am in Ohio). People all over the country have been motivated to lend support (money, phone banking from their house, etc). Why not reach out to them through Google ads? The only thing I found was this:

It is an ad with a link to a form to allow you to donate money to support Coakley (albeit somewhat indirectly through the DSCC). There should be Republican ads popping up.

The second facet of Brown's online strategy I want to discuss is that of social media. I read this interesting blog post just the other day written by Professor William A. Jacobson (Cornell Law School) - http://legalinsurrection.blogspot.com/2010/01/brown-massacres-coakley-online.html. The charts Jacobson provides are quite telling. Brown is a topic that people are finding very interesting and talking about. Some of this is probably due to the recent national attention the race has been given, but there are two candidates in this race. Voters are finding Brown's social media efforts to be engaging, helpful, and motivating. Coakley appears to be uninteresting. Interestingly enough, in the previous CNN article Coakley's campaign's excuse for not running Google ads was to focus on social media. Clearly her campaign has failed. I also want to point out that so many people have taken interest in Brown's social media outlets that he is receiving positive and free grassroots advertising. Take a look at the YouTube videos at the end of the blog post that were created by average citizens mocking Coakley's campaign strategies.

Don't get me wrong, Scott Brown is a great candidate beyond what he has done with technology. He is active, motivated, respected, thoughtful and unlike his opponent, he is gaffe free. Even so, in a state like Massachusetts a Republican is going to have to be way above and beyond their opponent. The lessons from Brown's campaign are clear. Online campaign is not a theory. it is not a fad. It is a communication tool that gets the Republican's message out and it has put Obama in a very awkward spot.

Below are some of Brown's online resources. Please check them out!
Website - http://www.brownforussenate.com/
Twitter - http://twitter.com/scottbrownma
Facebook - http://www.facebook.com/pages/Scott-Brown/178795233167
YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/user/scottbrownma

The next post will be February 2nd.

Republicans and New Media

About a month ago the Ohio Erie County GOP Chairman Mathew Old asked be to put together a document with my ideas on how Republicans can leverage new media. My hope is that this document can help campaigns begin to think about new media and ask important questions. Below is the link to the document and the summary.

Republicans and New Media (pdf)

Many will argue that "traditional" media has evolved over time. In many ways, it has. From the written word, to the radio, to the television it seems the dynamic of media is on a continuous and steady march. However, in the past few years there has been a fundamental revolution in media. It is the advent of the Internet. Traditional media is all one way communication; the advertiser has all the power, controlling the information while the public is at the mercy of billboards and commercials. The majority of the public does not have the resources to broadcast their thoughts and opinions to millions of people. With the arrival of the Internet, individuals have just as much power as the advertiser. They can write a post on a blog that will reach just as many people, if not more, than a TV ad. They can tweet and Facebook their friends about their positive or negative opinions. Many organizations fail to understand the multidirectional nature of communication on the Internet. They are stuck in the traditional media mentality and end up annoying customers with spam and failing to address complaints that are instantly shared with millions of fellow users.

Corporations are just now realizing that the Internet has given their consumers more power than their own PR departments. For the most part, political campaigns are even farther behind. The 2008 election gave rise to one political organization that clearly understands and respects the complex and powerful nature of the Internet: the Obama team. Obama’s new media campaign demonstrated that these technologies are relevant but no single organization can control the discussion. To be successful, a candidate must participate in the discussion, not lead it. They must use the opportunity to listen, not shout. They must sincerely engage voters, not spam them. A candidate must genuinely understand the paradigm shift, rather than simply jumping on the band wagon without understanding where the band wagon is going.

Republicans and New Media (pdf)

The next post will be Oct 13th.

Josh Mandel and YouTube

State Representative Josh Mandel recently announced he would run for Ohio Treasurer. He made his announcement on his website, www.joshmandel.com, using a YouTube video. It is an excellent video and Mandel obviously took advantage of professional help (good idea).



Mandel's video is simple yet powerful. He is able to show his background as a public servant. The video is displayed predominately on the home page and is about six minutes long. Not only does Mandel speak but various community members are interviewed on his behalf. He also shows images and footage from his previous campaign for the Ohio House and from his time as a Marine. Now the question of what should be in a video is probably better left to an expert in video production. What I am interested in is why YouTube is the method used.

First of all it is easily accessible. As long as you have a web browser, you can see the video. There is no software and no special plug-ins involved. YouTube is also efficient in displaying the video, so even those constituents that may have slow internet connection can see the clip. Millions of people visit YouTube's main site daily, so as an added bonus your video can be found outside of your own site. Finally, your YouTube video is easy to embed into any site. YouTube automatically builds a line of HTML code that you can put into your site. It is just copy and paste.

Secondly, uploading your video to YouTube will increase your searchability. YouTube is another place someone might type your name into a search bar. You can now type "Josh Mandel" into both Google and YouTube and get results. When running a campaign you want your name in as many places as possible. Using YouTube to host your own video kills two birds with one stone.

Lastly, it is a free service. You can post as many videos as you like, but the size of the videos are limited (think of this as a tool to keep your videos concise and too the point). Hosting video on your own server can be expensive. Videos typically take up lots of disk space since they are big files. Depending on your arrangement with your host, this could severely limit what you can do on your server. There is also the potential that you would slow down traffic to your site with a bulky file to download.

http://www.joshmandel.com/

The Power of Social Networking Sites

The other day I was browsing around on Facebook when I thought it would be fun to see what State Senator Kirk Schuring was doing with the Facebook network and tools I had built up for his run for Congress. The fact that his fan page no longer existed did not surprise me. The fan page was for his run for his Congressional campaign and not him personally. Since the election was several month ago and he lost it seemed appropriate that it was removed. The thing that did shock me was the fact that Kirk Schuring's Facebook profile was also gone. If I did not know better, the assumption would be Sen. Schuring is leaving politics all together.

As of writing this I have not heard back from my former contact close to Schuring on the topic. However, I feel that this is a very important topic that needs discussing. I do not mean just Sen. Schuring's Facebook page, but all politicians and all social networking sites. "Networking," the meeting and greeting a wide variety of people who typically hold important positions, has been a keystone to a political career since the beginning of time. Pessimists often call this "knowing the right people." However, I want to point out getting to know people in your constituency personally not only helps one get elected, it is also responsible governance. Our political leaders should have a well established communication line with business, labor, and other organizations who are all stake holders of government in a democracy. Not too long ago this meant picking and choosing who to talk to on a regular basis to form specific points of contact within a constituency. The realities of time and resources limited politicians to just communicating frequently with those in key positions like business executives, union leaders, and other politicians. When you are competing for a constituency as large as say a U.S. House of Representatives' seat, it does not make sense to ask hundreds of thousands of people "What do you expect from your government?" You would get more meaningful and useful information by talking to those who represent various interesting within your constituency.

Within the past few years, the very definition of networking has changed. Of course talking and getting to know those traditional points of contacts are still important. The Internet, however, has allowed the politician to make everyone a meaningful point of contact. Again, this is not just a great way to get elected, but a responsible step for a politician to take to better represent his constituency. Take Facebook for an example. As described before, Facebook allows an individual running for office to reach out to anyone else with a Facebook profile. Multiple individuals can describe to you very quickly and efficiently what is on their mind and how they feel towards certain policies. You can also send out information on your campaign, activities you are currently engaged in, or what ever position you currently hold. It gets everyone in your constituency involved.

Now, I understand that there is a concern with the perceived generational divide. The younger generation uses the Internet and does not vote, while the older generation votes but does not use the Internet. Let me briefly touch on that issue. The fact that the younger generation uses the Internet but does not vote should be viewed as an opportunity. Think of them as a massive group of undecided voters. If you want to bring them in, why not reach out using a medium of communication they enjoy using? Spark an interest in politics, and you may have a life long follower of your future campaigns and the Republican party itself. The second problem, of the older generation voting but not using the Internet, probably deserves more credit then the first problem. The Schuring for Congress campaign did have individuals complain that too much was being done via the Internet and not traditional mailings. Stories like these motivate campaigns to dismiss bold new ideas with technology, especially ones that have very limited resources and man power. Why not do what has worked for them in the past. To just say times have changed would be unfair, even if true. I have seen the older generation begin to give in to these new technologies, especially those on the Internet. To give anecdotal evidence, last week while in a hotel an older gentleman asked if I could help him with the computer set aside for guests to use. His problem was that the screen's resolution was set way to low. It was an easy fix for someone who frequently uses computers, and understandably confusing for someone who does not. When he began to use the computer, I could not help but notice he did not know how to type. It was very obvious that this man has rarely used computers (or typewriters) in his life. However, after all this, the older man's only goal that evening was to check his Facebook page.

So, now that we have a good cause for a social network online, how do we go about creating one? First, do not use just one online medium. I talk a lot about Facebook, but that should only be the foundation. Facebook is a great way to draw people in and organize your supporters (typically you search Facebook for an individual before you do on other sites) but you should do more. Try branching out. Create a YouTube page and post videos of speeches, events you have been to, or just a homemade video to help voters get to know you better. Set up a Flickr account to host photo galleries to show just how active in the community you really are. Start Twittering (see February 17th, 2009 post) to show how much time and thought you put toward governing. There are so many options, there is no way I could list them all in one post. Make sure that all your social network resources are tied together. That is, advertise your Facebook account on your Twitter, and vise versa. You want people to have reason to be engaged with your campaign, spend time at your sites, and most importantly, have a reason to keep coming back to revisit.

Another thing you absolutely need to do is start early and commit early. In the race between State Sen. Kirk Schuring (R) and State Sen. John Boccieri (D), one man started early and the other did not. Sen. Boccieri (now Rep. Boccieri) had his Facebook page built up before most Republican candidates even announced they were running in the primary. The Schuring campaign was just starting to dabble in Internet campaigning when I started working for them in the early part of that summer. There was never any excitement in the Schuring campaign about the Internet. Even the website was frequently neglected. Very rarely were the online resources used in conjunction with what was going happening on the ground. Every week I asked that the Internet sites, especially Facebook, be mentioned in the email newsletter. I wanted to advertise in many locations as possible to help build up a community of Schuring supporters. But every week, the newsletter lacked that information and frequently encouraged people to go to events that had already happened. The Internet was just too low of a priority for anything useful to get off the ground. On the other side, Boccieri's sites always seemed to be buzzing with activity. There were links to things such as the YouTube video of Ohio Governor Ted Strickland endorsing him and photos of his tour in Iraq. He had many "friends" on Facebook and frequently interacted with them. There were reasons to visit Boccieri online. His followers were with him from the day he announced his run all the way to when he won the election. His resources are still online as of writing this post.

Once the election is over, the next thing to do is continue to build the network. As a responsible leader, you can use the network to get opinions on issues facing your constituency. It helps you stay connected to the average person within your constituency. You should continue to meet and greet leaders in the community personally, but you should never forget who you work for, everyone. Even if you lost and do not hold an office, it is still important to hold on to that network. Those people believed in you once and will probably believe in you again. The next time you run, you will have already had a base built up that you can activate with a click of a button. These networks are great sources of donations and volunteers, not to mention, again, helping you better relate and lead your constituency. We should think twice before throwing a whole network away.

The next post will be on March 31st.

References:

Facebook -
http://www.facebook.com

Boccieri for Congress Facebook page -
http://www.facebook.com/home.php#/pages/John-Boccieri/8919181490?v=info&viewas=7725102

Twitter -
http://www.twitter.com

YouTube -
http://www.youtube.com

Flickr -
http://www.flickr.com