Tuesday, May 11, 2010

Gauging Social Media enthusiasm on Youtube in the Ohio Governor's race...

These days in politics, everyone has to use Youtube.

It can do everything from communicate directly to your activist supporters, to promote a message, to introduce a candidate, to changing the tone of a campaign.

Doubt me? Talk to Lee "Hairy Shoulders" Fisher.

In other words, Youtube is an essential element of any decent campaign's communications plan.

And in Ohio, John Kasich's campaign is dominating his opponent.

His Youtube channel recently surpassed 100,000 views.

Governor Strickland, who started behind the curve and didn't start up his channel until a few months after Kasich, has only 14,817. And almost half of those views come from the $500,000 attack ad the Governor unveiled a week ago.

To be fair, the Governor's "Ask Ted" series was hosted on Vimeo for awhile. Going back over two months those videos have compiled only 1,955 views. Those same videos were reposted on youtube a few days ago and their total views as of last night had increased by 65. And every single one of them is an instant cure for insomnia.

What about each campaign's kickoff videos? How did they do?

Kasich - 6,076
Strickland - 829

The big video for Kasich was his Meet John Kasich video, coming in at 40,015 views.

So what's it all mean?

Nothing dramatic. No one is claiming these videos and their total viewership will swing the election, but they can help shape it.

An effective youtube video can put another campaign on the defensive, introduce a new theme to the campaign, or rev up your volunteers. It can do a lot of things. And the campaign that does it best increases their chances to win.

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