Friday, September 11, 2009
News What is new media's place in mayor's race?
Posted by Scott Henry @ScottTheHenry on Fri, Sep 11, 2009 at 7:40 PM
Don't read this expecting an answer because I don't know. Obviously, websites and social networking have assumed a prominent position in politics since Howard Dean first used the Internets to build a coalition of Deaniacs and Daily Kos became a must-read blog for millions.
Speaking as a reporter, I find myself questioning a candidate's commitment if he can't be bothered to put up a website. But does Web savvy portend a winning campaign?
Take a look at the three leading candidates for Atlanta mayor. Recent polls say Mary Norwood is leading the pack, followed fairly closely by Lisa Borders, with Kasim Reed trailing. But when it comes to attracting supporters on Facebook, Reed is far and away the front-runner. He's got 4,502 Facebook supporters, compared with 2,886 for Borders and a mere 881 for Norwood.
According to Emory University associate professor Michael Leo Owens, as quoted in the AJC, “This will be the Facebook election.” Does that mean Borders and Norwood should pack it in?
Over on Twitter, Reed has 1,817 followers, despite the fact that he posts only once or twice a day. Borders, slightly more prolific, has 2,085 followers. Norwood, who can go several days between tweets, has only 195 followers.
What's the significance of all these numbers? Are they an accurate reflection of overall voter support or do they merely indicate generational differences between the candidates' core supporters? In Norwood's case, I'd definitely say the latter. This is a woman who's probably met each of her supporters face-to-face at one time or another. Personal contact beats virtual contact any day.
I'm guessing most people reading this page have strong feelings about the importance of social networking and online communication. What do you make of these stats? Do they mean anything?
Comments (20)
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Don't forget Keyser's 10k base on the ATAC Facebook page. (not that it likely means anything)
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All data bases are unique. To put a dollar value on one would be the stuff of statisticians. And wizards. What is unique about the ATAC data base is that it has a track record now of providing some very valuable earned-media and boots-on-ground actions... things that make a good politician swoon. Using a virtual data base to promote and provide a group action is playing out all over the place - be it a townhall scenario or the wildly popular, now-weekly Atlanta "TweetUps." What we have yet to see, or measure rather, is whether virtual data bases will provide actual votes. Or boots to the polls shall we say. We DO know that many old Atlanta voting blocks are gone, quite literally in the case of our housing projects. New ones will take their place. Most any "block" of anything now has at the very least a FB page. As I'm as hungry as the next political junkie for some real data, some real stats on the matter, I hope our pollsters will be out and about, particularly for exit polling, to gather some data about what DID motivate people to get up off the couch and go vote for a particular candidate in this mayoral race. Until we know more about the voting habits of the virtual data base, the most savvy politicians should keep those iPhone and Blackberry fires lit up. Way up. One e-blast to a virtual data base, just before the polls close, could put anyone over the top in this one.
Just another minor point to note: Reed has almost another 3,700 people in his Facebook group... Not to mention over 6,000 on Myspace and 500+ on LinkedIn...
Kasim Reed is by far the most energetic and enthusiastic candidate in this race. He's moving up in the polls by out working his competitors. Meanwhile Borders misses forums and engagements on a daily basis. Something tells me she'd be absent as mayor as well.
I was surprised at how much of a presence Kasim has on facebook. It's definitely helped him reach younger Atlantans. I wish him the best of luck.
I wonder if Lisa Borders removed Aaron Turpeau as a facebook friend when she banished him from her campaign lol. That was the biggest joke I've heard throughout this race. I guess he wasn't her surrogate, he was just facebook stalking her.
More krap from Mohammed Kasim's kronies. The main reason Kasim has so many Facebook/MySpace/LinkedIn followers is primarily because he's been on these sites longer than the other candidates. Let's get that part right -- it's more about longevity than popularity. And his constant spamming on my wall is a mess. Seven to eight updates a day is unnecessary! Meanwhile, Lisa just got back in the race in April, and six months later, she has built quite a substantial social media following that HAS MOBILIZED INTO OFFLINE SUPPORT! I should know -- I'm one of her Facebook supporters. Miss Mary on the other hand, claims to have an Internet business, but yet only really dipped her toe into social media in the past month or two after getting spanked red by the other candidates in that arena. The others, like poor Uncle Jesse, are just playing catch-up and looking stupid. Borders does NOT miss forums and engagements on a "daily" basis -- get your facts straight! As City Council President, she stands in AS MAYOR when the actual Mayor is gone, so who best to have mayoral experience than someone's who has actually SERVED THAT POSITION? Don't make me laugh.
Making fun of Kasim Reed's name...that's real GOP of you Borders Boy. It didn't work against President Obama and it won't work against Reed. However, ya'll have really been showing your true colors in the past few weeks. Give us more lol p.s. Not every black male is a thug. Thank you.
One quick, real-time note here on the power of a virtual database in association with an emotional trigger for group activation purposes (that emotional element is kinda crucial)... in less than 24 hours the newly formed FB group to protest the actions of APD in the raid on the gay bar last night now has 184 confirmed "yes" respondents to a protest event recently "created" for tomorrow. And that number is likely to double between now and the actual event. Of course the number of people responding with a virtual "yes I'll be there" will not match the numbers of the people who actually show-up in person tomorrow... BUT given that this is an emotionally-charged event/issue, I imagine the translation of virtual numbers to actual face-to-face participants tomorrow will be quite high. And again, this is a less-than-24-hour group that sprung up out of an, er, event. For people to engage in this way, there must be that critical emotional investment. Can a politician go that kinda distance in a mayoral race? Well, that's up to the issues as applied to an emotional reaction by the people, isn't it? There is some kinda mathematical formula that could be applied here, but I'll leave that to the mathematicians and not the aging party gals. The FB group Community Rally Against APD Raid at The Eagle Atlanta can be found, and responded to, here: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=71765164966&ref=mf
DaleC, you're still worked up over that? An advertisement criticizing an unelected official that ran in papers 2 years ago? Get with the times, guy. Never mind that silliness. What the "muhammed kasim" comment (where the hell did that come from, anyway? makes no sense) and the attention paid to President Obama's middle name have in common is that they are both attempting to associate the politician in question with Islam, which acquired kind of a bad rap a few years back. Kinda ridiculous that I'm having to explain that, but then again, nothing is ridiculous on the internets.
Actually I think the facebook is very innovative. I joined Kasim groups after a few invites and have enjoyed receiving his updates, and I've actually went to a few of his events that I would not know of other wise that he publicized on there. I joined Borders also, however hers was not updated much. However there was a forum I found out about from facebook and when I went there I decided that Kasim is the best candidate to get Atlanta back strong.
The Vote-O-Meter has picked up changes since the last post on August 30. If the mayoral election were held today, the Vote-O-Meter projects Mary Norwood at 41%; Lisa Borders - 27%; Kasim Reed - 26%; Jesse Spikes - 4%, Kyle Keyser - 2%; Peter Brownlowe – 0%. Borders has moved ahead of Reed, perhaps due to the blowback from the memo disclosed by Turpeau. Norwood has lost a little ground. Reed is wrestling with how to convince voters he should be in the runoff. Spikes is stalling. Keyser is stirring the pot.
Who made Matt Towery the God of polling? Why is everyone referencing a poll by a clearly biased pollster? How do the numbers move (for any of the candidates) that drastically in less than a week? According to his poll, how is Mary Norwood pulling the majority of African-American support when you have one candidate whose grandfather has been damn near iconic in the black community and you have another who has been endorsed by the most prominent African-American figure in Atlanta politics? I don't trust anything he says. Why isn't Lisa Borders releasing any of her internal polling numbers? Why don't I see more articles referencing Cornell Belcher's recent poll? He's widely known, highly well-respected, and credible. He polled accurately for the President?
Don't forget Jesse Spikes! In just two weeks, Spikes has energized his Facebook page with 911 friends and is approaching 400 Twitter followers. In an interview on V-103 last week, Mayor Shirley Franklin called Spikes "brilliant!" You need to learn about this guy! He's very smart, experienced in business and law and is not part of the city hall cabal who have gotten the city into this mess. www.jessespikesformayor.com
Quantity is less important than quality here. It's rad for someone to have 10,000 followers and all, but if they're not being mobilized for any purpose, then the person with 100 heavily-involved people may be getting more mileage out of it. Kyle managed to raise his qualifying fee on Daily Kos, Facebook, and Twitter, so it appears he's getting the most bang out of it so far. That could very well correlate with his supporters being a younger demographic. I guess we'll see in the coming months. I'm a little gunshy about prognosticating impact after watching Paul Broun mop the floor with everyone with pretty much no SM presence whatsoever.
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