In various candidate and party offices throughout the country at the moment, a consultant, expert, ninja, communications scientist, says something that Obama has managed to make use of social media to create a "grass root movement" that led him to the US presidency. Those of you who are candidates or party staffs do yourself a favor and ignore him. They will offer you absolutely nothing at this stage. They are more likely to do you harm than good.
The reasons are too many, but let us summarize them in the two most important. First you do not have enough time to set up something serious and important in social media and generally on the internet if you have not already done so. Second, the most likely thing is not to do it well.
The first one doesn't need much explanation. As for the second? A serious candidate-level campaign requires, at a minimum, setting up the right site, texts, creatives, finding people or groups to post content in social networks and mainly they will have the responsibility of handling many small jobs that may seem easy but are not. The minimums are photo adjustment, video editing, content modification depending on the media that will be uploaded and in general many, many small but important things that, if done on the knee, will spoil the image instead of improving it.
If we are now discussing a party, things become even more demanding. They need sustained productions at the creative level, many times more in volume than a simple candidate. Banners are needed. Processes for simplifying messages. Finding, evaluating and training volunteers. Keyword management strategy for search engines, checking which ones it reads correctly and which ones should be bought to fill the gap, needs constant measurement and optimization. Continuous control and measurement of whether appropriate messages on social networks such as Facebook which has a complex algorithm choiceof appearance reach the right audience and these are all just the essentials.
It is understandable that there are too many variables that it is not easy to control if all of this has not been designed and thoroughly studied early. It is extremely difficult to find people who have the requisite specialized knowledge even at market level, let alone at the level of party mechanisms. As if it did not reach this, there is the most difficult to control variable. The complete ignorance of party mechanisms for basic communication principles in the social media. Most people think that a good strategy is to talk nonsense on twitter and fight with opponents. In the past, blog response groups were in vogue. Rarely is there a provision for spreading messages through media with specific targets, a look at the parties' facebook pages where press releases from the leader or spokesman's statements are usually posted.
How little the party mechanisms are cooked in these issues Greece it is shown by incredible blunders into which they have fallen. The most recent was when ND put "New Greece" as its central slogan and SY.RIZ.A bought the domain neaellada.gr that was available because no one thought to buy it lest they set up some serious campaign on the searches of "New Greece" ". I personally also have a great story about the response to a simple tweet that I waited four days for approval and final text from the political planning office of a major party.
In conclusion, dear candidate or contact person of the party. Make a favor for yourself and us who will be forced to block or hide you. Limit to simple. Run a banner campaign to send to your site and up there. Make some retargeting. The other wants trouble, resources and time you do not have. If you do it for a long time and with the appropriate team, the conversation changes. The ninja mentioned above that told you how to become the new Obama or how to become a viral is irrelevant and dangerous and it is good to throw him out with kicks.
