Open Source Brett Bell
7 Social Media Lessons from Canada’s Election
ith the federal election now a month old, we’ve all some time to review the election campaign and what impact, if any, social me- dia had on electoral politics in Canada. As someone who works in the field of social media, it was interesting to watch the fluctuations in senti- ment around social media itself from both the media and the punditry. On the eve of the election being called, the chatter was how much social media would affect or alter the electoral outcome. When there was no real immediate voter movement, the excitement around online campaigning seemed to deflate – only to be resurrected by stories about vote mobs, Face- book stalkers, sh#t Harper did and “viral videos”.
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The election provided more proof that social media is but a tool. The message is and will continue to be the most important part of any social media effort you produce. You can have the flashiest, most integrated campaign in electoral history, you can have a large presence on every channel, every app, but if your message (or to a lesser extent, messenger) doesn’t connect or resonate, you’re done.
After much thought, review of data and articles on social media during the election as well as some pointed conversations with seasoned campaigners much smarter than me, I have crafted a few conclu- sions that I can draw in the aftermath of one of the more exciting elections we’ve had in Canada.
Nobody Has This All Figured Out. Yet. That’s not to say that various parties didn’t do some
great (and not-so-great) things during the election pe- riod. But no one party nailed everything. I’d say the
12 Campaigns & Elections | Canadian Edition
NDP was probably the closest to running a fully inte- grated campaign: from the design of their online assets, to their mobile app, to web-only videos, online town halls, regular e-mail fundraising campaigns and their online ads, they put a lot of resources into the effort. To be fair, so did the Liberals. But I give the edge to the NDP, who had a lot fewer resources to work with going into the election, but still were able to put together an online offering that rivalled their better- funded rivals. Good for them. But the 41st election is proof positive that politi- cians and parties still use social media for transmitting talking points rather than engage voters. And all par- ties are guilty of that. To some extent, it makes sense: a good message (more on that below) plus discipline (and massive ad buys) can equal results. The Conser- vatives showed us that.
Content Is Still King The election provided more proof that social me-
dia is but a tool. The message is and will continue to be the most important part of any social media effort you produce. Despite the laudable efforts they made online, the Liberals had no clear message and their messenger did not inspire. And the results reflected this. The Conservatives had absolute clarity on their key messages (as did the NDP) and were able to lever- age all channels to deliver it. But it is worth repeating: you can have the flashi-
est, most integrated campaign in electoral history, you can have a large presence on every channel, every app, but if your message (or to a lesser extent, messenger) doesn’t connect or resonate, you’re done. Michael Ig- natieff is the poster child of this very important rule.
Satire Wins, Especially Online Beside Twitter’s dominance (which I speak about
below), I think one of the bigger social media lessons we can take away from the election is that people are still attracted to entertaining content. Former Prime Minister Kim Campbell famously said that an elec- tion isn’t the place for serious discussion on impor- tant, complex issues. Well, some of Campbell’s theory was borne out by a lot of the more popular online items discussing the election. Canadians naturally gravitate to satire as a preferred
form of commentary and this expressed itself in the digital environment. Sites like Sh*t Harper Did and
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