Digital Campaigning Archives - Social Media and Politics

#173: Micro-Influencer Marketing for Political Campaigns, with Ryan Davis

April 21, 2024

Ryan Davis, Co-Founder of People First, discusses how “micro-influencers” or “micro-creators” are being used in political campaigns. We discuss the benefits of using micro-influencers for engagement, as well as how they can be used to target specific blocks of voters. Ryan also shares how these creators can inform the political strategy of campaigns through panels and focus groups, and how the comments to creators’ content can reveal themes and sentiments important for the campaign.

Here’s a list of resources on micro-influencers written by Ryan and People First:

White paper on micro-influencers

2024 election guide on micro-influencers

In-and-outs of influencer outreach

An overview of influencer trends

#156: Digital Political Advertising Beyond Social Media, with Megan Clasen

January 8, 2023

Megan Clasen, Partner at Gambit Strategies, shares her insights into digital political advertising for persuasion and mobilization. We discuss the role of social media ads relative to CTV and OTT advertising, as well as how political ads compete with corporate brands for inventory on these services. Megan also shares her experiences with Facebook’s ad ‘blackout’ period during the 2020 campaign and how the Biden campaign responded to countering Trump’s advertisements. …And much more!

#145: Political Tech Incubators in American Digital Campaigning, with Eric Wilson

May 29, 2022

Eric Wilson, Managing Partner at Startup Caucus and Host of The Business of Politics Show, discusses political tech incubators and their emerging role in US digital campaigning. We chat about how the Republican and Democratic Party need different tech solutions for different campaigning styles, the need for start-up campaigning firms, and the potential impact of Web3 on future political campaigns.

Here’s the link to Eric’s blog post on Web3.

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#142: Comparing Digital Political Communication across Countries and Time, with Prof. Anders Olof Larsson

April 24, 2022

Prof. Anders Olof Larsson, Professor of Communication at Kristiania University College, shares his comparative social media research on party communication. We start out with a macro-level look at political parties’ adoption of Facebook and Instagram across Europe, before focusing more specifically on Scandinavia. Prof. Larsson discusses the pros and cons of political merch contests in driving engagement, and how hashtag network structures have evolved over time on Facebook and Instagram in Norway. We also discuss post virality and Prof. Larsson’s work comparing viral posts in Norway across Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube.

Here are the studies mentioned in the episode:

Longitudinal studies of European party communication:

Picture-perfect populism: Tracing the rise of European populist parties on Facebook (2022)

The rise of Instagram as a tool for political communication: A longitudinal study of European political parties and their followers (2021)

Studies using Norwegian data:

‘Win a sweater with the PM’S face on it’ – A longitudinal study of Norwegian party Facebook engagement strategies (2020)

‘Coherent clusters’ or ‘fuzzy zones’ – Understanding attention and structure in online political participation (2019)

Winning and losing on social media: Comparing viral political posts across platforms (2019)

#131: Digital Ads for Registering and Mobilizing Black and Latinx Voters, with Tatenda Musapatike

August 15, 2021

Tatenda Musapatike, Founder and CEO of the Voter Formation Project, shares her insights on using social media to mobilize non-white voters. In her prior role at Acronym, Tatenda led the Expand the Electorate project, which used digital ads to register and mobilize Black and Latinx voters in 8 target states. In this episode, we discuss the results of Tatenda’s work in the 2020 US election, the racial biases in data and targeting technologies, and how gender differences between Black voters might be overcome in future electoral cycles.

Here’s the case study from the Expand the Electorate project and more detailed white paper (requires email sign-up) – definitely worth a read!

#129: Political Marketing, Digital Strategy, and Social Media for the Yang 2020 Campaign, with Andrew Frawley

June 27, 2021

Andrew Frawley, former Director of Marketing at Yang2020, shares his experience running marketing and digital strategy for Andrew Yang’s 2020 campaign. Andrew discusses the role of social media for outsider campaigns, challenges in establishing growth on social media, and the role of podcasts for political campaigns. We also discuss campaign slogans, differences between outsider and mainstream campaigns, and Facebook groups as organizing hubs.

Check out Andrew’s website for more experiences from the campaign!

#120: Digital Ads for Political Mobilization and Persuasion, with Nick Ahamed

January 24, 2021

Nick Ahamed, Director of Analytics at Priorities USA, shares his research on the effectiveness of digital ads for increasing voter turnout and support for Democrats. We discuss the field and survey experiments that Priorities USA has been running to find the optimal messaging strategies, targeting approaches, and treatment lengths for political social media ads during elections.

#115: Bad News, Social Media, and Digital Campaigning in Britain, with Dr. Mark Pack

October 4, 2020

Dr. Mark Pack, President of the Liberal Democrats, guests to discuss his new book: “Bad News: What the Headlines Don’t Tell Us.“

We talk about some of the flaws of election campaign coverage and how to be better consumers of news using social media. Dr. Pack also shares his insights on digital campaigning in Britain, where he ran digital operations for the LibDems in the 2001 and 2005 general elections.