The Portman Effect

Senators April 8, 2013 Leave a comment

As the Supreme Court considers two high-profile cases on same sex marriage, others are weighing in too.  And recently two unlikely politicians have been making headlines for their endorsements of gay marriage—Republican Senators Rob Portman and Mark Kirk.

Portman was the first Republican senator to publically endorse gay marriage a day before the Supreme Court began hearing arguments on the issue.  Kirk made a similar announcement last week.  Let’s see how Portman and Kirk compare in national news and social media garnered from their statements.

As might be expected, Portman received a lot more attention in national media for his announcement—not only was he the first to make such an announcement, but the timing of his announcement came as the national spotlight was on the SCOTUS cases.  Portman also has a higher-profile in the Beltway, having been considered a possible GOP Vice Presidential candidate and for his involvement in budget issues.

NATIONAL MEDIAKirk & Portman NM

On Facebook, Portman and Kirk got significant bumps in likes on their Facebook pages around the time of their respective announcements, however Portman received more likes compared to Kirk.

FB LIKES DAILY CHANGEFB DC

What’s more telling is the spike in FB mentions that Portman received both at the time of his announcement as well as on the heels of Kirk’s announcement.  Portman gained momentum after Kirk’s announcement, even while buzz about Kirk had subsided.  It seems as more politicians publicly support same sex marriage, credit is given to Portman for being a trailblazer on this issue.

FB TALKED ABOUTSFB TA

Portman has a larger Twitter following than Kirk—with 27,803 followers as of the writing of this post which is 64% more followers than Kirk.  If we look at the daily change, Portman saw a greater upsurge in followers around the time of his announcement compared to Kirk.

TW FOLLOWERS DAILY CHANGETWF DC

Check back here to see how lawmakers and pundits are gaining attention in the press and in social media for their statements on other hot-button issues.

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DEFINITIONS:

National Media includes: WSJ, LATimes, NYTimes, WaPo, HuffPost, Fox News, CNN, USA Today.

FB Likes Daily Change is the change in the number of Facebook Likes on each person’s page compared to the previous day.

FB Talked Abouts is the number of unique users who have created a story about a page in a 7 day period.

TW Followers Daily Change is the change in the number of Twitter Followers on each person’s Twitter account compared to the previous day.

NJ Gov. ’13: Buono versus Christie is officially on

Daily Top Ten, Governors February 11, 2013 Leave a comment

Up in New Jersey, Chris Christie is pretty popular. He’s oft rumored to be a 2016 GOP Presidential contender, and he’s a regular guest on David Letterman. One thing that he also picked up last week was a Democratic challenger for his Governor’s seat come November. Her name is Barbara Buono (means “good” in Italian), and she’s the former Senate Majority Leader in the NJ Legislature.

Buono

 

 

She’s also gaining Twitter followers like nobody’s business.

 

Screen Shot 2013-02-11 at 10.32.10 AM
(Twitter Followers Gained in the last 7 days overall)

 

Screen Shot 2013-02-11 at 10.43.24 AM
(Barbara Buono’s TW Followers gained last 7 days)

 

This, of course, makes it seem like Buono’s office paid for or somehow malevolently increased 1300% of their Twitter followers in one day. To be clear,…we don’t know and we may not even care. This is the New Normal in politics now. Perception that you have a huge Twitter following will help you gain that aforementioned Twitter following in the upcoming months.

 

What we do know is that she now has a nice, big mouthpiece to tweet out loud as often as she wants.

Screen Shot 2013-02-11 at 10.47.56 AM

 

And it seems like she loves to tweet about President Obama, Michelle Obama, and even Gabby Giffords. But, over the course of 2013, we’re pretty sure she’s going to start getting into some stuff around Hurricane Sandy, the NJ unemployment rate being higher than the national average, and maybe, just maybe, even donuts.

 

Run these charts yourself at TrendPo.com! 

CA Congressman Tom McClintock figured out Facebook!

House Members February 10, 2013 Leave a comment

Tom

Three term CA Congressman Tom McClintock (pictured above) is one of California’s most well known conservative Republicans. He unsuccessfully ran for governor in the 2003 gubernatorial recall (opposite the Terminator) before winning the 4th Congressional District in 2008. From Wikipedia:

“During the 112th Congress McClintock was one of 40 “staunch” members of the Republican Study Committee who frequently voted against Republican party leadership and vocally expressed displeasure with House bills.”

 

But now, it seems like McClintock’s aiming for another angle. Over the last week, McClintock ranked 3rd in gaining the most Facebook Likes (between Ashley Judd and Rand Paul) in TrendPo’s ranker:

Screen Shot 2013-02-10 at 4.24.13 PM

 

If you look at his campaign page on Facebook, you can see that he’s got a huge number of FB Likes (198,875) and FB Talked Abouts (84,421):

Screen Shot 2013-02-10 at 4.26.58 PM

 

In fact, over the last 30 days, he would be ranked 6th in Facebook Talked Abouts between Rand Paul and Glenn Beck:

Screen Shot 2013-02-10 at 4.31.53 PM

 

WTF?! How did this happen and when did it “click on” for Mr. McClintock??

 

A deeper look at McClintock’s Facebook page shows that he uses status posts 89% of the time:

Screen Shot 2013-02-10 at 4.36.53 PM

 

But those statuses are gaining massive likes and shares:

Screen Shot 2013-02-10 at 4.35.24 PM

 

And when Mr. McClintock does use media, he likes to use videos:

Screen Shot 2013-02-10 at 4.34.59 PM

…which also gets 626 shares and 1,295 likes.

In any form, he’s getting some massive likes and shares from his almost 200,000 fans.

 

One would think that he’s just got a great digital media team (which he does), but most likely his office decided some time ago to invest in buying Facebook ads and grow their fan page. When did they decide this?

 

Oh, I would say around January 4th…
Screen Shot 2013-02-10 at 4.42.45 PM

 

None of this is bad or “illegal” mind you. Facebook makes it easy for anyone or any brand to buy a lot of fans through Facebook ads. It makes a lot of sense that Congressman McClintock wants to increase his exposure online, and it does seem to be helping since everything he posts is being shared by hundreds of his fans (including his speeches on the House floor!). In the New Normal of politics, you’re going to see Facebook and Twitter being less a novelty and more a necessity when it comes to growing your personal brand. Tom McClintock’s gotten a headstart, and he’s doing so well that he was flagged in our daily scrapers.

I mean seriously, how easy is it to get yourself sandwiched between Ashley Judd and Rand Paul in anything??

 

(Writer’s Note: I have no proof that Mr. McClintock’s staff actually paid for the gain in Facebook likes and activity. They may very well have been gained through hard work and great posts. Or….they may have been purchased. You can look at the chart between Jan. 4th and Jan. 5th and then tell me what you think.)

 

Run these charts yourself at TrendPo.com! 

Who’s winning the Northeast Blizzard story?

Daily Top Ten, Governors February 9, 2013 Leave a comment

Back during Hurricane Sandy, we did a blog post about NY Governor Andrew Cuomo’s performance in the news and social streams pre and post event.

Now, with the big northeastern blizzard upon us, let’s take a look at who “won” the Blizzard story this past week. Specifically, we compare five prominent Northeastern politicians: Andrew Cuomo, Chris Christie, Mike Bloomberg, Deval Patrick, and Cory Booker (we picked these guys because they are all media savvy, but you can do these chart comparisons on anyone you want here).

 

NATIONAL MEDIA COVERAGE 
NM

Mike Bloomberg wins hands down in national news media coverage. Just on Friday, he was in 16 National Media articles, and he’s been consistently in the news all week. Cuomo and Deval Patrick were close with 11 and 10 articles a piece. Interestingly, Cory Booker wasn’t mentioned at all in the national press this week.

 

FACEBOOK TALKED ABOUTS 
FBTA

However, Mr. Booker dominates the Facebook and Twitter spheres. All week, he’s been consistently over 20K Facebook Talked Abouts, twice the number as the closest 2nd, Mike Bloomberg.

 

TWITTER FOLLOWERS GAINED EACH DAY
TWF

On Twitter, Mr. Booker is also right at the top, gaining between 500 and 1000 Twitter followers each day this week. Mayor Bloomberg has also been active on Twitter as well, with only Governors Patrick and Cuomo lagging behind.

 

What does this mean? Well first, it’s interesting to see that while the press media reports on everything Mayor Bloomberg says, the online social sphere trends towards Mayor Booker. To be sure, Bloomberg is no slouch online himself, but this is an area where Cory Booker has definitely put in the hard work for social (FB / TW) to be his mouthpiece. How he translates his online popularity to get more coverage in National and DC Beltway press may be one of the bigger stories of his upcoming Senate campaign.

 

 

DEFINITIONS:

National Media includes: WSJ, LATimes, NYTimes, WaPo, HuffPost, Fox News, CNN, USA Today, NPR, The Economist

Facebook Talked Abouts is the number of unique users who have created a story about a page in a 7 day period.

 

Run these charts yourself at TrendPo.com! 

TrendPo’s Daily Movers and Shakers

Daily Top Ten February 8, 2013 Leave a comment

Each day TrendPo ranks the Political World on news, sentiment, and social momentum. Here are some highlights:

Rubio

 

#5. Marco Rubio (+11) — Marco is in the news for a lot of things from immigration to climate change, but a new poll released today shows that Rubio is now more popular than President Obama.

#10. Steve King (+45) — The Iowan House Member leaps into the TrendPo Top Ten trying to defend an attack from the Rovinator. He better mount a defense quickly lest he be known as the third brother of Akin and Mourdock.

#17. John McCain (-10) — John McCain drops ten spots because he hasn’t been on CNN in the last 18 hours.

 

See the entire list at http://www.trendpo.com

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