Washington DC

Event: Social Politics: How Technology Has Helped Campaigns

Panelists:

Adam Conner (Facebook)

Rob Saliterman (Google)

Mindy Finn (Twitter).

Gambler’s Fallacy (n): 1) The misconception that the odds of red occurring are more favorable because black just happened. 2) The reason you’re crying at 4 a.m. outside of Harrah’s.

The Obama 2.0 Fallacy (n): 1) The misconception that Obama’s 2008 digital campaign is the paragon for every politician until the end of time. 2) The reason a lot of politicians’ digital campaigns lack strategy.

It can be argued politicians were late-adopters of social media, but I don’t buy that. Just like many large, risk-averse entities are now starting to refine how they embrace digital, elected officials were spectators for a while. It’s no surprise they were trepidacious – considering the level of scrutiny, removing another piece of body armor would give any campaign manager an anxiety attack.

Then Obama 2008 happened. In so many ways, it was a convergence of the right ingredients: young, progressive candidate + new levels of platform maturity + antithetical Republican candidate – whom ‘liking’ on Facebook felt like accepting a friend request from grandpa. The Obama 2.0 campaign capitalized on these variables – intentionally and incidentally – to become the case study for political use of digital.

The wacky thing is, 2008 was a long time ago. Some platforms are still around, but have undergone significant changes and others have emerged. As part of Social Media Week D.C., Powell Tate held a panel to discuss these topics and more with three of the major players: Facebook, Google, and Twitter.

From this discussion, a common theme emerged: They’re no longer explaining what the platforms are, but how to use them.  A big indicator is the pure scale of adoption since the mid-2000s:

• 98% of Congress and every major federal agency is on Facebook
• Close to 90% of Congress on Twitter, with 15-20% of Congress members tweeting themselves
• Many politicians have hosted Google+ Hangouts – including Obama, Gingrich, and Romney

Compare this to four years ago during President Obama’s assault on digital when 30% of Congress was on Twitter and politicians’ official presences were fragmented across Facebook as Pages, personal profiles, groups, and who knows what else. That and MySpace was a major player – Obama had more than 7X the number of friends (844K) on the platform than followers (118K) in November 2008.

Clearly, the landscape has changed, but Obama’s 2008 run is still used as the golden standard. It’s not relevant for every candidate. As Google’s Saliterman pointed out, one simple example is the use of geo-targeting paid media for smaller campaigns, which can be used effectively when budgets are smaller and blanketing is not an option.

As Twitter’s Finn pointed out, there’s also a great opportunity for campaign teams to use social media as sources of intelligence – an “instant window in the world.” Not only can this help inform staffers what to anticipate in, say, Iowa City, it can also provide a chance to nip issues in the bud by taking a stance publicly on platforms. “We used to talk about ‘rapid response’ – now it’s ‘real-time response’ – it has made campaigns frenetic.”

Lastly, all three emphasized a major tenet social media professionals are sick of even saying – connecting with real people. The difference is, politicians are dealing with constituents. So, while someone who doesn’t buy a bag of Skittles affects Wrigley’s bottom line, users who feel disengaged on Facebook can handicap a campaign. “All of this is about citizens connecting better with their representatives,” Conner said. “It’s a really powerful thing.”

That “powerful thing” may be the big difference between 2008 and this year’s race. Obama was able to use digital – social, SMS, Web, etc. – as an engine to drive donations and let voters feel like they could get to know him. Now, it’s evolved: Voters expecting candidates to know them. Obama 2008 made voters flies on the wall, Obama 2012 – or any campaign for that matter – needs to make voters participants. We’ve moved to a deeper level of access and politicians must sidestep the Obama 2.0 Fallacy to find their own ways to connect.

“Just because Obama did it, doesn’t mean it’s right.”

Thanks to Powell Tate, the panelists, and moderator Alex Howard for a meaningful discussion. You can find more SMW discussion on politics at the hashtag #SWMPolitics.

Written by Blake Bowyer, an official Social Media Week DC blogger. Follow him at @BlakeBowyer.