At this point it doesn’t really need saying that Barack Obama’s online campaign gave him a handy advantage over John McCain, that his social networking strategy allowed him to recruit and organize hundreds of thousands of volunteers in a state-of-the-art get-out-the-vote exercise. His rather nifty iPhone application even went through supporters’ contacts and prioritized by battleground state the friends they should call on his behalf. It may be creepy, but you can’t deny it’s clever.
And, of course, he raised at least $500 million in small donations, mostly online. That’s the kind of wad that gets you 30 minutes of primetime network TV real estate less than a week before polling day.
Now he’s got a country to run, it’ll be interesting to see whether that vast online community comprising millions of connected, vocal, engaged supporters remains a blessing or becomes a curse. As ever, it all depends on whether the reality of the product lives up to the promise of the marketing.
The Washinton Post points out that his database of more than 10 million email addresses and that fat Facebook friends list could allow him to bypass the mainstream media and appeal directly to voters. It gives him a huge amount of leverage if he decides to govern more from the center than a left-leaning Congress would like. He can try to forge a grassroots consensus and advance an agenda with or without the help of legislators.
Meanwhile, a transition Web site, www.change.gov, invites suggestions as to what the new administration should focus on. It’s impressive, 21st Century Stuff, and all signs are that the Obama team is taking digital democracy seriously.
But as the Post and others have pointed out, there’s a real risk of the new president being hoist by his own petard if he doesn’t listen to the well-organized community that fervently believes it propelled him into office.
If he backs down from campaign promises or adopts pragmatically conservative positions, he’d better watch his back. As well as giving people the sense that they have a stake in his presidency, he’s given them the tools to mobilize opposition against him if he disappoints them.
That kind of accountability is great. Whether he’ll welcome being pounded by the machine he created is another question.
If he appoints John McCain as Secretary of Defense (which is apparently a distinct possibility) watch the netroots go utterly apeshit and start demanding Obama’s head.
The thing to remember, I think, is that whilst the Obama team has all those emails, had all those millions of small-money donors, all those tens of thousands of volunteers, they remained – at the policy level – a small, inaccessible group of political experts no different than, say, the Clinton team. None of those millions of Obama donors got to impact on policy discussions and positions. Obama made it very easy for people to get on his bandwagon and to feel part of the bandwagon, but the actual direction of the bandwagon always remained under the control of a small number of advisors. People *felt* like they were in control of the Obama campaign, because they agreed with everything he was saying (because who doesn’t want change after the last 8 years?)… But, like you say, just wait for them to find out that they don’t agree with what he’s doing…
What I think will be different is that when the Obamaites are (inevitably) disappointed, Obama will at least be super-transparent with them about his decision-making process.
What you say is true: when you garner that sort of “unconditional/fanatic” support, things can turn south quite fast, as soon as your base realize you can’t live up to 150% of their expectations.
But I guess it’s always been true, for all leaders.
And since we’re talking marketing, it’s been true for a lot of brands too: when you play this card, you better not screw up – “New Coke” anyone?
However, it’ll be interesting to see how such tremendous potential can be used in politics: with such a large base of advocates, Obama can raise issues directly with them and let them do the job that politicians in office usually have to struggle with media to get through.
Why bother convincing the biased media when you can talk directly to people ready to take your message out there?
Of course not all will agree with you at all times, and they might not all be great influencers, but it’s still better than the media distortion no one pays attention to anymore.
Could be a train wreck, could be an unprecedented success, in any case it’ll be interesting to follow.
[...] in how Barack Obama used social media to help him get elected. Dan’s blogged on it, as has Jeremy and Leo even gave a presentation about it. But what about McCain? Y’see all too quickly we [...]