A lot of outstanding insights have surrounded the role of social media in politics, namely in the presidential candidacies, which has social media pundits everywhere pumping their fists a la Kirk Gibson circa 1988.
As much as this does inspire a conceited reinforcement of my work in the digital arena, I remain level because I think everyone now recognizes that social media is merely an evolution of our time: socio-environmental trends + digital assets = necessity for peer-to-peer, two way communications. So why wouldn't political figures leverage the digital age to have genuine conversations with voters? However, I'm intrigued to contribute to the conversation when I read this post on Fred Wilson's blog earlier today where he made several interesting observations, including:
"I just checked the exploratory committee websites of Hillary, Obama,
Edwards, McCain, and Romney. A few have blogs (or so they call them).
Not one of them actually write any posts."
The old adage goes that showing up is half the battle. Well, in an uncharacteristic 'glass-is-half-empty' moment, I'd like to voice that "showing up" on social media channels isn't even half the battle. Simply having a prescence on social media properties such as MySpace and YouTube doesn't cut it. Uh-uh! Today, people are suspicious about marketing. And heck, even as a marketer myself, I'm skeptical that John Edwards himself replies in his MySpace. The voice isn't authentic to me.
How is this approach any different from traditional marketing where key messages completely devoid of personality and dialogue are pushed one-way to the audience? Yes, different channels attract different demographics and the more touchpoints, the better. I get that but that isn't the point. The bottom line is social media is about joining everyday conversation. Merely posting pictures, canned responses, and videos of speeches isn't leveraging social media for value. It's showing a complete ignorance of the medium.
So a collective word to Hillary, Obama, Edwards, McCain and Romney: what you're doing is creating a bigger megaphone. What you need to do is have better conversations with potential voters. Even if you're short on time as Fred mentioned, you would not believe the power that 1-2 genuine sentences (read: actually from you) posted everyday holds. MySpace and YouTube are social media tools. The real power is unlocked by interaction, engagement, and at the highest level, empowerment.
I realize I'm somewhat presenting this as "damned if you do, damned if you don't" proposition. And ending this post on that note would be bad form. So here's one possible solution: why not provide a daily video blog about your travels across the country as you meet the military, police, and firefighters of the nation? Forget the high production costs of commercials that I'm never going to watch anyway. Let's see some authentic content and hear some genuine messages that we won't get anywhere else.
I'm nothing if not helpful so here's a sample marketing plan I put together (I'll use Hillary per this example):
Goal
Primary: Generate awareness for Hillary Clinton.
Secondary: Launch an online political evangelism program around Hillary Clinton.
Target Audience
Primary: Top influencers of online communities around the nation (insert appropriate party preferences here).
Secondary: (insert appropriate geographic clusters here)
Campaign Length
Short- and long-term, high-impact
Modes of Engagement
Vlog, posted 5 times a week (at minimum) available at:
Note: this is an example of just one mode of engagement.
Hope this helps!
-Johnny
P.S.- To Fred: it took 35 minutes, 16 seconds to bang out this post.
P.S.S.- This blog post endorsed by supporters for Johnny Chan 2008.
Weekends
are a bit like rainbows; they look good from a distance but disappear when you
get up close to them. - John
Shirley
“We must become the change we want to see.” - Mahatma Gandhi
“Cockroaches and socialites are the only things that can stay up all night and eat anything.” - Herb Caen quotes (American Columnist, 1916-1997)
High achievement always takes place in the framework of high expectation. 
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