There have been quite a few articles written about the use of social media by the candidates in this extended US election cycle. But, when you look at those who are no longer candidates, their use of these networks has generally stopped. (Hillary – 2 tweets since she dropped out of the race, Chris Dodd hasn’t even logged into MySpace since January, etc.)

Which leads me to believe that they don’t really buy into these tools as a way to keep in touch with their electorate unless it’s either time to beg for money or votes. Yes, it takes resources to stay involved with these networks, but they do have a staff that they can task an hour or two a week to throwing up a blog post, or tweeting some accomplishment.

In the long run, they’ll be seen as active participants on these networks rather than just trying to subvert them to their needs every 2-6 years.

When you get to the office of President, there is the official website – Whitehouse.gov – that lists the latest news, holds the archive of Presidential radio addresses, and puts up the occasional video (the last one currently listed is 3 months old). Now, the Whitehouse does have a twitter account, but I could not find a link to it from the whitehouse website,

Looking at the UK, they take a slightly different approach. The Prime Minister’s office has an official Website – number10.gov.uk – that also lists the latest news, but it also has links to the official YouTube channel, the official Twitter account, and the official Flickr account (not just photo opps by the PM, but also shots of the Downing St. garden in bloom) – all of which appear to be in regular use.

The site also asks for voters to participate and engage by requesting that they submit videos to the YouTube channel for the PM to respond to. And, allows users to create and promote petitions on the site that will then be delivered directly to the appropriate people within 10 Downing Street.

What’s also great about the UK approach is that there’s a level of tongue-in-cheekness about it too. When one national newspaper took advantage of the petition capability to get 50,000 people to petition to have the PM replaced with a popular TV celebrity, the staff at 10 Downing Street threw together a quick video response.

Naturally, there were some that responded that they were upset that taxpayers’ money was spent to create the response, but they’re the ones that don’t get it. It doesn’t matter that it was frivolous, it shows that they are in fact listening. It shows that they are using these tools to engage their constituents year round, not just in an election cycle.

American politicians would do well to look at this and think how they can incorporate social networking into their off-campaign time, because doing so will really help them when it comes to campaign time. If you’re wondering about Obama’s VP pick… 2 tweets this month, and 4 all year for Senator Biden…

Filed under: Social Marketing on Monday, August 25th, 2008 by Simon Heseltine | 1 Comment
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