One topic that I have wanted to broach is the notion that Barack Obama utilized social media to win the 2008 presidential election. I have been avoiding this topic because I don’t want to take a political side, but it is possible for everyone to learn from this example so I will post about it anyway:
Barack Obama has been tagged as the “First Social Media President” by SearchMarketingGurus.com. In his post on the subject, Li Evans marks the event of Barack Obama’s election as way more than the election of the first African American president. His election also marked the first time social media played such a huge role in an election. Barack Obama was the first candidate to go beyond traditional campaign tactics such as blast emails or phone calls.
It is commonly known that Barack Obama and his campaign team mobilized the masses encouraging more people than ever not only to register to vote but to actually vote. Talk about getting personal: Barack Obama exposed himself as an open, easy-to-talk-to guy and not someone just talking at constituents. On his website, Obama for America, people are able to create “MyBO” accounts and be active on the website. The site also includes BarackTV, “Obama Mobile” and an impressive list of links to social networks including the usual suspects of Facebook and Twitter, but also some networks that I’ve personally never even heard of. – an obvious move that Obama tried to/is trying to reach everyone everywhere in everyway.
His social media strategy also included My.BarackObama.com, a blog, a Flickr page, a youtube page. I personally receive the emails addressed to “Ansa” and signed “Barack” and during the campaign, I felt so connected to the man. In another post Evans followed up on the subject. Apparently, Obama has launched a number of new sites to help citizens understand his presidency, starting with Change.gov which included a variety of ways for Obama to really hear and react to what citizens were saying. And the economy? Obama launched Recovery.gov to keep people posted.
Complete transparency and open communication (liked I’ve been saying all along) is the key! Proven by our current president, social media can inspire people to trust in you and follow you. It’s transparent; it’s authentic. I completely agree.
April 14, 2009 at 2:48 pm
Yea, I for one followed Obama’s site during the entire election to view his speeches from around the country and get a better idea of who the man was through his bio movies. I was also on the email list and would consistently receive at least one notification about something every other day. Not only are the emails in written form, but often they include videos and links to newspaper articles and other sites. Obama’s use of social media tools definitely helped put him over the edge in my mind. I remember trying to go to McCain’s site to see if he was utilizing this tool to the same degree, but it was difficult to navigate, visually confusing and and additionally unappealing. Cool post Ansa.