Highlights and having a Christmas rest!

After hectic blogging throughout this year I have decided to take a Christmas break for a few days. Thank you to everyone who has stopped by over the year, I look forward to seeing you again in 2008. Happy Christmas!

In the meantime feel free to look at some of the http://www.nickburcher.com/ posts that generated most traffic this year:

Politics and the internet posts

http://www.nickburcher.com/2007/10/search-is-big-opportunity-for-political.html - Search is a big opportunity for politicians

http://www.nickburcher.com/2007/10/search-is-big-opportunity-for-political.html - Election 2.0?

Posts about Facebook - largest groups and examples of people using Facebook cleverly:

http://www.nickburcher.com/2007/11/list-of-largest-facebook-groups-part.html - List of the largest Facebook groups (part 2) and the difference between 'I am a fan of' and 'I am a member of'

http://www.nickburcher.com/2007/10/biggest-largest-groups-on-facebook.html - The biggest / largest groups on Facebook part one of my list!

http://www.nickburcher.com/2007/09/5-great-examples-of-retailers-using.html - 5 Great Examples of retailers using Facebook

Other high traffic posts - Batman and newspapers!

http://www.nickburcher.com/2007/11/8-great-examples-of-newspapers-using.html- Great examples of newspapers using digital

http://www.nickburcher.com/2007/11/batman-dark-knight-with-heath-ledger.html - Batman Dark Knight with Heath Ledger, viral seeding starts 18 months before release!

Kevin Rudd and the Kevin07 campaign - Is David Cameron taking notes?

The Australian election campaign is coming to an end with the poll just a few days away. Kevin Rudd is 18 years younger than the incumbent Prime Minister, John Howard, and has used digital extensively (far more than his opponent) under the Kevin07 banner. His efforts have been criticised by some for pushing information at voters rather than engaging them in two way conversations, but there is no doubting the importance that digital has had within the Kevin07 campaign.
The Kevin07 homepage (http://www.kevin07.com.au/) has been used to co-ordinate the various different online activity employed by the Rudd campaign. The homepage links to the Kevin07 Myspace pages, the Kevin07 Facebook Group and the Kevin07 YouTube channel. It also allows supporters to sign up to be distributors of viral email, runs polls / petitions and aggregates associated Kevin 07 blogs. Association with developing media channels (and the 'Kevin07' concept) has arguably allowed Kevin Rudd to appear modern and fresh compared to a long serving incumbent.

There are some interesting comparisons that can be made with UK politics. Like Kevin Rudd, David Cameron is significantly younger than his adversary and is seeking to harness online properties to help reposition the Conservatives as a party for the future. Kevin07.com has a UK equivalent in WebCameron and this is starting to become a well developed entry point to the internet.

A big difference though is that David Cameron is not running a scattergun approach and trying to use every channel he can find. He has (cleverly) resisted the lure of setting up Kevin 07 Facebook / Myspace equivalents and has instead focussed on running online video pieces in strategic areas. Webcameron carries video highlights, the Webcameron YouTube channel is used in a similar way and there is an interesting experiment that is running on Friction TV (though admittedly these all seem to have the same content showing.)

These channels do not necessarily have the visitor numbers of Myspace or Facebook, but they are appropriate for David Cameron's content and will engage people effectively as a result - something that may not have been possible with Myspace or Facebook.

However Webcameron and the other channels are not promoted particularly effectively. Occasional references to Webcameron in speeches (eg the recent Zeitgeist speech) will not drive traffic alone. An effective link generation campaign in conjunction with a targeted Search campaign could boost visitor numbers and engagement significantly. Viral ad messages spread through Facebook's new advertising system (targeted by voting preference / party identification) would also be an interesting way of reaching out to supporters and boosting the Conservatives 'modern' credentials.

Nick Burcher writes: "Kevin Rudd is not the only politician running a heavy digital strategy, but he is the closest to election day. It will be a major coup if he can unseat the incumbent Prime Minister and if it happens, then the Kevin07 digital campaign will be widely credited. Barack Obama and David Cameron will be watching closely!"

Search is a big opportunity for political parties and politicians - I ran a Search campaign to prove it!

I recently wrote about how UK politicians should be using the internet to a greater extent. Of particular note was the lack of a Search / Google strategy that the candidates and political parties had. I then highlighted these thoughts by running my own keyword campaign over the 36 hours when Gordon Brown was deciding whether to call an election.

The Conservative party seem to be the most technologically savvy party with sites like www.conservativehome.com, iain dales blog and webcameron. Given the recent branding of the leaders (Gordon's not flash, but 'David Cameron is a hottie') I felt targeting the Conservatives would produce the most interesting results.

I ran a targeted keyword campaign and bought a variety of words and phrases. When people searched for these terms on Google, an ad promoting my blog posts was shown:

I bought obvious phrases like 'David Cameron', 'Conservative Party' and 'Vote Conservative'. I bought terms like 'general election', 'november election' and 'snap election' and I bought less obvious terms like 'Webcameron'.

The results were very interesting. Topline statistics:

- My ad was always on the first page and often in top position. This demonstrates how few people were advertising against these terms. It still amazes me that at a key time the only ads I was appearing against were topical ads from the Sun and the Times - what a missed opportunity for the political parties!

- These ads gained a high click through rate - 'general election' generated a click through of 4.25%. This shows how hungry people are for information, and again shows how much of an opportunity Search is for politicians.

- The first 10,000 impressions were generated for less than £7. This make Search significant more cost effective than a mail shot (even if it's delivered by hand)

- The top 3 Searches were on 'David Cameron', 'Conservative party' and 'general election.' However the 'long tail' (the less obvious terms) like 'Webcameron', 'William Hague' and 'snap election' were also searched on and produced low average costs.

- Adding Google's partner sites to the campaign (through Google site targeting and the Google content network) boosted responses and a significant number of people were searching for 'David Cameron' on AOL

Nick Burcher writes: "Overall the results of my political Search campaign back up my theory that Search is a big opportunity for politicians and political parties in the UK!"

Footnote - Since this experiment and my initial posts, my local candidate Chris Phelp has started running a campaign on Google and has even had ads shown on this blog:

I have emailed him to congratulate him on his initiative and have asked him for feedback but he has declined to respond so far!

Video of David Cameron touring the Google offices from Webcameron and full video of his speech at Zeitgeist

David Cameron has been speaking at Google Zeitgeist in California and touring the Google offices. Putting the politics to one side, it is interesting to see a UK politician embracing essentially a US media owner in this way and it's a clear demonstration of how influential Google now is in society.

WebCameron is used cleverly to show edited highlights, whilst the full speech (and subsequent questions) are shown on YouTube.

Webcameron (brief highlight of the speech and inside the Googleplex):

YouTube (full length Zeitgeist speech + questions):



The software and programme that David Cameron shows whilst in the Google offices is created by Swedish professor Dr. Hans Rosling. Dr. Rosling is a quite brilliant presenter and his full presentation on world development (using the software from the clip) can be seen here:

David Cameron, Facebook groups and his Conservative party conference speech

David Cameron closed the Conservative party conference yesterday with an hour long speech. This speech covered many topics but also, surprisingly, included reference to Facebook.

David Cameron's video channel Webcameron may not have worked out in the way that he had anticipated, but it appears this has not discouraged him from further experimentation with Web 2.0. Extensive surfing of the David Cameron groups on Facebook revealed 2 Facebook groups that he then cited in his conference speech - 'David Cameron is a hottie' and 'Am I the only person who doesn't like David Cameron?' (There are obviously others and they are listed here: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/10/03/ncam203.xml)

Cameron said: "We live in an extraordinary world of change and freedom. The internet is transforming people's lives. The website MySpace has got 130 million members. If it was a country, it would be the tenth biggest country in the world. Facebook, the social networking site, 30 million members. People using it to talk with each other and meet people. I had a look the other day. There is a network on Facebook called 'David Cameron is a hottie'. It's got 74 members. And I looked a little further and there is another network called 'Am I the only person who doesn't like David Cameron?' and it's got 379 members - I am sure there is nobody here today."

Since the speech 'David Cameron is a hottie' has increased from 74 to 377 members and 'Am I the only person who doesn't like David Cameron?' has increased to 1274 members. My favourite wall post is on the latter group: 'Don't like him but need to find out where Samantha Cameron's black and white dress was from asap. Anybody got any ideas?? xx'

Nick Burcher writes : 'Including a couple of sentences about Facebook has generated a large amount of PR online and has helped to enhance David Cameron's credentials as a modern politician. Whether it will do him any good in the polls remains to be seen, but general perception seems to be that the inclusion of Facebook was a clever move.'

'David Cameron is a hottie' group - http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2248966723
'Am I the only person.......?' group - http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2248466580

UK politicians and political parties should be making more use of online

I have written various posts recently about UK political parties' internet strategies and today Media Week published a letter from me on this subject under the heading 'British Politicians Need An Effective Search Strategy."

Nick Burcher writes: "With WebCameron, binge-drinking virals and The Sun using search to promote its campaign for an EU referendum, the internet is fast becoming an important campaigning tool in UK politics. However, when compared to recent election campaigns in other countries, the UK seems to be lagging.

The French election saw widespread use of the internet, from supporters clashing outside virtual Second Life headquarters through to extensive use of blogs and websites. The US is also seeing heavy use of online (particularly Web 2.0) properties in the presidential race. While it's hard to imagine Gordon Brown using Twitter, UK political parties should be emulating aspects of US campaigning strategy, especially in search.

Just look at Mitt Romney's extensive search activity, from achieving top ranking against the phrase "War In Iraq" to image optimising - you'll never see a bad photo of him on Google Images.

John McCain has bought various issue-related keywords and Barack Obama, the most technologically advanced Democrat, has run a variety of keyword campaigns to push potential voters to his website.

Search in the UK though remains vastly underutilised as a political campaigning tool, yet it could lead to some very strong voter engagement, enabling party leaders to keep their campaigns continually up-to-date and enhance their association with particular causes.

For example, "hospital" generates more than one million UK impressions a month, yet no party advertises against it.

A political search campaign could effectively enable targeted policy pledges to appear against a wide variety of terms, from education to the environment.

With the traditional restrictions on TV and radio campaigns still in place, it is natural that UK parties will see outdoor as their main broadcast medium.

However, the internet should be an integral part of their strategies too, and although most politicians understand the capacity for the web to create hype, they will be missing a major trick if they don't have an effective search strategy.

http://www.brandrepublic.com/InDepth/Features/741608/Letters---2-9-October-2007/

UK Political Campaigning - Top 5 tips for Search Engine Marketing

The Liberal Democrats are experimenting with paid for search on Google, typing 'DNA database' into Google produces an ad for the Lib Dem campaign to stop 'Labour's DNA database plans. There are few other examples of UK parties and candidates using Search effectively - though the Sun newspaper have bought a variety of political keywords (including ‘Gordon Brown’ and ‘David Cameron’) to promote their petition for an EU referendum!

Using Search could lead to some very strong voter engagement, enabling party leaders to keep their campaigns continually up-to-date and enhance their association with particular causes. For example, no party links itself with the term NHS and yet it generates over 1 million UK impressions a month on Google, likewise the word ‘hospital’. Variations on these phrases like ‘NHS Direct’, ‘local hospital’, ‘nurse’ should also be used to drive numbers and get the message across. Few advertisers bid on such general keywords and political parties could target policy related ads to these terms for as little as 1p per ad, though this is only payable if someone clicks on it! The cost per click mechanism means campaign costs can be tightly controlled and there is little in the way of production cost - there is a real opportunity here to get across targeted policy messages whilst driving traffic to the relevant party / candidate web page in a cost effective way.

These strategies are being employed in the US presidential election, however some Presidential candidates are making more use of Google AdWords than others. Mitt Romney has had extensive Search activity (from achieving top ranking against the phrase ‘War In Iraq’ to image optimising – you’ll never see a bad photo of him on Google images!) John McCain has bought various issue related keywords and the most technologically advanced Democrat campaigner, Barack Obama, has run a variety of keyword campaigns to push potential voters to his website. UK politicians should be emulating some of the US candidates’ online campaigning tactics, especially in Search.

Nick Burcher writes: “With the traditional restrictions on TV and radio campaign still in place, it is natural that UK parties will see outdoor as their main broadcast medium. Most UK politicians understand that the web offers a variety of opportunities to create hype through web 2.0 tools like You Tube, but they will be missing a major trick if they don’t take advantage of the targeted opportunities offered by Search Engine Marketing.”

My top 5 recommendations for UK political campaigning using Search:

1) Buy candidates names – if you type David Cameron into Google, the Conservative party should ensure that a positive message is shown
2) Buy party names and help voters get to websites easily
3) Buy issue related keywords - Gordon Brown wants the next election to be on Health, then why not show policy pledges when people type in health related keywords
4) Buy topical keywords in line with news coverage or policy announcements and steer people to relevant pages (both for own party and for opponents)
5) Buy relevant keywords on topics you wish to be associated with eg “time for a change”, “a better Britain” etc

Election 2.0?

The lead headline on this week’s Campaign magazine is that Saatchi and Saatchi have been appointed to handle the Labour Party’s ad account ahead of the next election. The image accompanying the story is a huge poster that features the headline ‘Not flash, just Gordon.’

The ban on political advertising on TV and radio explains why UK political advertising has traditionally been around posters, but it is interesting today that the article still focuses on the poster medium rather than the new opportunities presented by the internet. This may of course be a reflection on Campaign magazines priorities rather than an indication of election strategy!


There are a large number of ways that the internet can be used to connect with the electorate and innovative, cost effective ways and the party that is able to take best advantage of this will be in a good position. The timing of the last election means that Britain has never had the opportunity to have a Web 2.0 powered general election. It is therefore necessary to look abroad to find examples of how online, and specifically Web 2.0, can be best used to connect with voters.

The Conservative party have been experimenting with advertising in UGC areas and have been successful in generating PR in recent months. Webcameron got some good exposure, advertising on Facebook Groups has created widespread coverage and more column inches have been generated today as a result of running the first Tory ad in gay media – a banner on PinkNews.co.uk.

The internet has not always produced good PR though (see the furore after a group of backbench MP’s produced an unauthorised viral – below!)



Labour and the Liberals have not exploited the internet to the same extent, but all the parties have a long way to go before they are able to realise the full possibilities of the user-driven programs that now exist online. UK parties could learn from recent elections abroad where political organisations and parties have used the internet extensively.

You Tube is being used more and more by political organisations. I mentioned (and linked to) the Downing St website in a post below, but it is also worth viewing some of the content on the European Union You Tube channel. Cleverly called EUTube it features 3 different languages and shows policy / debate footage across a range of topics. A good template for others to replicate!

http://www.youtube.com/eutube

When it comes to campaigning though few have got as carried away as the Australian Labor Party leader Kevin Rudd. He has embraced online for the forthcoming Australian elections and through his site at Kevin07 he gives links to his blog, You Tube, MySpace and Facebook sites. In the past he has been criticised for under-using the internet, but he seems to be making up for it now!

http://www.kevin07.com.au/

Rudd may also have taken note of some of the digital ideas seen in the French Presidential election. Nicolas Sarkozy embraced online far more than some of his opponents and made it a critical part of his election strategy – just having an internet strategy helped build the impression that he was the futuristic candidate and the one most capable of reforming France. The Sarkozy team appointed an internet advisor, the blogger Loic Le Meur, and established a number of initiatives in the online area.

One of the most important steps for Sarkozy was to recognise the power of ‘word of mouse.’ Some of his policy proposals would encourage entrepreneurship and proposed reductions in red tape would make it easier for individuals (like Bloggers) to be self-employed or run their own businesses. His manifesto was built on change and was also perceived as being pro-technology. These policies appealed to the French blogosphere and after personal contact, a range of influential bloggers were persuaded to declare support for Sarkozy (even though they may never have voted this way in the past). Influential, opinion-leading bloggers then spread the pro-Sarkozy message across the internet and the ‘word of mouse’ effect was very beneficial to the Sarkozy campaign.

http://www.sarkozy.fr/home/

There were some other nice touches in the election campaign for Nicolas Sarkozy – Flickr, YouTube, Netvibes and dailymotion were all used. Sarkozy also attended 3 online conferences in different locations around France, made speeches and then took live questions from the internet. He embraced interview opportunities at all levels – on the one hand he was on national TV, on the other he was working with bloggers and podcasting the results - one of the most significant things was the creation of an L’Ille Sarkozy in Second Life where all his campaign supporters could congregate. This became a virtual campaign headquarters and was very active every day, regularly hitting the SL user capacity. Other parties (like Le Pen’s Front National) set up headquarters and Second Life became a virtual French election battle ground – rivals would argue and debate as well as use Second Life weapons to attack each other!





The whole Sarkozy election campaign was very creative and whilst I feel some people are going too far by claiming that the French election was actually won by the internet, I think it is a mistake to underestimate its potential influence on a campaign.

http://www.loiclemeur.com/english/2007/05/closing_the_sar.html

Second Life has been a popular vehicle for campaigning in a number of places, not just France. Dutch politicians held a real time debate in Second Life last November, a couple of weeks before their general election. Under Japanese law politicians are forbidden to use anything except pamphlets or postcards to campaign. They were therefore banned from using the internet to campaign during their elections. Some tried to bend the rules by using SL to 'chat' rather than 'campaign', but this was soon stopped too and buildings were boarded up for the duration of the election!

Second Life has also been used by US candidates to hold rallies and fund raising dinners. Indeed the USA is the place to look to see the internet being used to the full in campaigning. Illinois senator Barack Obama is the leading 2008 Presidential candidate in terms of web traffic and BarackObama.com had the most unique visitors in July, with 717,000 (Nielsen / Net Ratings.)

http://www.barackobama.com/index.php

Obama announced his exploratory committee via an online video clip. His presidential campaign announcement is now ranked #2 on Brightcove.com’s Top 10 Buzz videos, between a porn clip and cover model’s video and he is currently utilizing the power of Brightcove by creating his own channel.

http://origin.barackobama.com/tv/

Obama is billing himself as the ‘technology candidate’ and he has a blog, a Flickr account and a strong Facebook following after making speeches at US universities. He also delivered his policy on net neutrality by podcast saying that “it is because the internet is a neutral platform that I can put out this podcast and transmit it over the Internet without having to go through any corporate media middleman. I can say what I want without censorship or without having to pay a special charge!” (Inspired!) A special Barack social networking site, http://my.barackobama.com, has also been developed.

It is yet to be seen whether Barack Obama can follow Nicolas Sarkozy, riding into office off the back of the internet, but he has made a good start and his web traffic is almost twice as high as his nearest competitor. UK politicians could learn a lot from the methods he, and others, are employing.

It is also worth noting that technology and the internet can also trip up politicians. Candidates have realised that their campaigns can hit troubled water through the actions of one person. George Allen’s horrible ‘Macaca’ moment on You Tube last year (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r90z0PMnKwI) or Hillary Clinton as Big Brother in a (pro-Obama) mash-up of the 1984 Apple commercial becoming a You Tube hit in March.



So what should David Cameron, Gordon Brown and the UK parties be doing?
Nick Burcher writes: “In the UK David Cameron has been doing some interesting things with WebCameron and You Tube and it feels like the Conservatives are leading the adoption of technology in UK politics. Of the MPs who have their own web presence, the majority are not particularly inspiring and I hope for a dramatic improvement in quality in coming months. I also believe that there are so many digital ways of reaching out and connecting with the electorate that parties need to learn lessons from other countries experiences and consider every option.”

Nick Burcher writes: "All parties should have a multi-faceted digital strategy and I think it would be really engaging (and popular) if the candidates would hold live events online (either in video or Second Life). There are some great opportunities now, I hope they take them!"

You Tube, Facebook, Webcameron and UK political campaigning - are politicians like David Cameron and Gordon Brown using new channels effectively?

Political parties and political institutions are trying to connect with people by using online channels. WebCameron or the Downing Street You Tube site (http://www.youtube.com/downingst) are relatively new initiatives and the Conservative party is advertising on Facebook, however UK online political advertising is a long way behind the USA. Recent elections in the US have made significant use of the internet and You Tube is being used to show the Presidential debates.





It will be interesting to see how the internet is used in any forthcoming UK election. The previous election was still dominated by posters and traditional advertising, but the development of Web 2.0 channels coupled with the all party agreement not to use outdoor for political campaigning means online strategy could be a significant factor. (In 1979 the ‘Britain isn’t working’ poster captured the public mood, will the next election be defined by an online campaign?)



Numbers will have to grow significantly though for the current sites and profiles to have any real influence. With the exception of Tony Blair’s congratulation message to new French president Nicolas Sarkozy (which generated over 500,000 views on You Tube) messages from the main political parties online are yet to generate significant traffic - films by David Cameron on WebCameron or Gordon Brown on the Downing St site are often measured in hundreds rather than thousands. Interestingly Boris Johnson seems to be the star attraction on WebCameron – the number of people signed up on ‘Boris for Mayor’ Facebook Groups is also very impressive!



Nick Burcher writes: “the attempts of the main UK political parties to utilise new channels are admirable and they should be applauded for their efforts to use the new opportunities available to them. However, the numbers of viewers are low and parties will need to be posting more inspirational and more relevant messages if they want to successfully use these channels to connect / re-connect with disaffected, young voters. Single issue movements like the Green movement are using the internet successfully (eg David de Rothschild organising the Second Life flood) whereas the main UK parties seem to persist with uploading soundbites and speeches from politicians in suits, not necessarily the best way to connect with younger audiences – unless your name is Boris Johnson!”