TV ads, debates, posters and leaflets used to be the only means for politicians to get their message across. Nowadays, unless you are a fanatic follower of American news channels or papers, it is most likely you heard most of what you know about the 2016 election race through social media.
US political advertising is forecasted to hit a record of $11.4 billion in 2016. This is 20% more compared to the last presidential election year in 2012. Digital media, including social media, is likely to break the $1 billion barrier for the first time (Borrell Associates, 2015). The decisive factor in the use of social media is simple; it is a platform through which the vast majority of voters can be reached, and that is half the battle if you are in politics. It enables them to use images and video, which tend to attract more views and stay in people’s memories for a longer time. More importantly, it allows politicians to present themselves in a more authentic way, which in this age is an important means of differentiating yourself. With the crowd now watching politicians’ every move the question is no longer ‘Who is using social media?’ but rather ‘Who is using social media the most effectively’?
Politicians are mostly using the digital media to reach the Millennials (25 – 34 years old). This is the largest voting demographic but until today they have the lowest voting turnout (McMahon, 2016). Winning over this huge part of the American population could be the key to winning the elections and engaging on social media just might be the way to do it.
So how do politicians know what to post in order to be most effective? It will come as no surprise, but they are backed by agencies that use, of course, Big Data. These companies use analytical tools that analyze all 190 million registered voters and use data such as browsing history to send them personalized messages (Ayyar, 2016).
But it is not only politicians that are showing interest in social media. Facebook, Google, Twitter and Snapchat are also making their efforts to get politicians on their side. Twitter, for instance, shut down two sites that tracked tweets by politicians that were deleted and even hosted a breakfast in Washington to engage election candidates. Snapchat offers special filters and 10 second video ads specifically for political campaigns and even hired ex-Google frontman Rob Saliterman, who was in charge of political ad sales during the George W. Bush administration. Google however is the absolute winner of the 2016 elections. From sponsored links, YouTube video ads and display ads on publishing websites such as New York Times, presidential candidates have ample opportunity to present themselves through digital media (Ayyar, 2016).
Stray (2016) compared the polls with mentions, however positive or negative, of candidates in social media. Maybe not surprisingly, the two line up almost perfectly. Solely looking at the social media buzz, there seems to be a clear winner of the 2016 elections; Mr. Donald Trump. Do you think a follower equals a vote or is social media popularity still separated from becoming the White House’s next resident?
References
Customized image from Adobe Stock
Ayyar, R. (2016). Here’s How Social Media Will Impact the 2016 Presidential Election, SocialTimes
Borrell Associates (2015). 2015 to 2016 Political Outlook
McMahon, S. (2016). Can social media impact the 2016 presidential election as much as Obama’s 2012 campaign?, Social Media Week
Stray, J. (2016). How much influence does the media really have over elections? Digging into the data, NiemanLab
Dear Anouk, thank you for your post! To answer your questions, I do not think a like or follow is equal to a vote. This is because not only US citizens for example like/comment on politicians posts, but also foreigners. Many foreigners have closely followed (or have been spammed by 😉 ) the US elections, but in the end, they are not allowed to vote. What they can do, however, is influence their American friends to vote, or discussion the elections with them. However, I do believe social media has a powerful impact on the elections. Afterall, almost everyone nowadays uses social media and is able to look up information, so it is impossible not to notice the elections. Hopefully, social media will influence people to look closer into candidates in order to make the right choice for them, and motivate them to vote.
Dear Anouk,
First of all, thank you very much for the very enlightening post. It is quite interesting to read it now, one year later, when the election has passed and there is an actual outcome. The reason it is so interesting to reflect back on this post, is that it provides a reasonable and viable influence during the election (i.e. social media), which came closer to the truth than expected.
After seeing that your forecast actually matches the outcome of Mr. Donald Trump actually becoming president, more truth can be seen in the social media effect. Thus, to answer your question, I would contradict Ananda and say that the number of followers on social media can actually represent the parties’ voters to a certain extent.
However, something interesting to consider is how candidates try to push their image by seeming to have more social media followers than they actually do. A good example is Trump, since it was revealed in May this year that from the 10 million Twitter followers he gained between January and May, 8.3 million are fake. Therefore, one needs to be careful and evaluate the followers to know how many actual followers a candidate has, so that a number of potential voters can be estimated.
Furthermore, I would not only be careful with examining the real amount of followers each candidate has, but also which pro-candidate tweets are real or not. The reason I am saying this, is because it was discovered before the election last year that 33% of pro-Trump tweets were made by bots, while Clinton enjoyed 22%. These bots are able to interact with other social media accounts to answer their questions, be of service, or spam them. Naturally most users do not realize this and since they see a rise in pro-Trump traffic, they are automatically influenced towards seeing him in a better light. Consequently, it is important to not only measure the total pro-candidate traffic, but also the actual traffic. Because the difference between the two can actually be a significant advantage that any candidate is looking for, due to its positive effects on the users.