Obama, McCain and Third party Campaign Sites

[Noah Wolfe]

The 2008 Presidential election was historic in so many ways. The most obvious historical change is of course the election of an African-American as leader of the free world (Barack Obama in case you hadn't heard). But this election will also be remembered by history because of the revolutionary way Barack Obama used the internet as a tool for organization and communication.

In class the other week we looked at some of the things that the Barack Obama campaign did right on their web site. The Obama campaign's work on third party sites was monumental as well. Let's take YouTube as an example:

Barack Obama's YouTube channel, had a huge YouTube presence. Without a doubt Obama received a lot of attention via YouTube. Here are just some of the most impressive honors earned by his site:

32nd most viewed YouTube channel of all time.
34th most subscribed YouTube channel of all time.

By comparison John McCain's channel, doesn't even crack the top 100 in either of these categories.

There is also a clear difference in the use of the video sharing site by the campaigns as well.

The McCain campaign posted 330 videos. Of which only three were viewed more than 1,000,000 times. His most watched video "Celeb" pulled in 2,200,000 views.

Obama on the other hand published 1,823 videos (clearly very active) and has 12 videos with 1,000,000 views or more. His most watched video "Obama Speech: 'A More Perfect Union'" was viewed nearly five and a half million times (5,440,000).

The Obama campaign was clearly in tune with how to use the net and what works. The McCain campaign may not have fared as well on YouTube simply because they didn't have the same amount of excitement around their campaign but that doesn't seem to be the case. In fact the McCain campaign seemed to be tone deaf on how to use third party web sites. A particularly glaring example was the difference in use of Twitter on election day.

On election day I visited Twitter's Election 2008 page. The Twitter Election 2008 page shows the Twitter feeds from each campaign at the top of the page and in the "body" of the page users can post their own personal campaign related "tweet". Here is a screen shot of the top of the page from election day:

Obama is asking supporters to vote for him and is providing information on how to find one's polling place. McCain on the other hand provides a link to an article on his web site that attacks a pundit. A check of McCain's direct Twitter feed shows this tweet was sent on October 24th, a week and a half before election day.

McCain's Twitter feed didn't lose the election for him but his cash strapped, enthusiasm deficient campaign missed opportunities to reach potential voters and motivate existing supporters with free third party sites. According to David Burch of TubeMogul Obama earned 14,548,809.05 hours of free video time on YouTube (length of each video x views). Joe Trippi estimates that if the Obama campaign tried to purchase that much TV advertising it would cost about $46,893,000.

The internet is changing the way elections will be won. Had McCain made better use of the free online resources available to him he may have had a fighting chance.

[Noah Wolfe]

@Siwar and Jackie

Change.gov seems to be hinting at a possible Presidential social network to come (ala my.barackobama.com), though I would guess they will move that operation to whitehouse.gov. (My theory on "change.gov" is that the domain is a pun on Obama's campaign slogan and the fact that it is his "transition" team's web site).
Imagine if JFK had been able to ask citizens "what they can do for their country" and then channel that willingness to help via an online network. It is very possible that one day Obama will be known for his "BlackBerry tweets" in the same way FDR was known for his "fireside chats".

[Jackie Cannon]

I love discussing Obama's campaign and its future implications because he did an amazing job at setting such precedence for future political (and commercial) campaigns. He generated a significant following and updated them pretty much every step of the way. But how does it keep that up once he moves into the White House? His change.gov website is the first step. The expectations on our President-elect are huge and it will be incredibly interesting to see how his social marketing precedence continues to transcend once in office.

[Siwar Bandar]

Hi Noah - very interesting points. I think that its great that the Obama campaign is still continuing to engage voters and online users after the election as well. The Obama team has set up a website for the office of the President Elect which includes weekly video addresses, an opportunity to share stories, a blog at www.change.gov