Show Us A Better Way - UK government releases data and appeals for public ideas

Show Us A Better Way is a new UK government initiative that has been launched by The Power Of Information Task Force, headed by Tom Watson MP. Through the http://showusabetterway.com website, launched on July 2nd, the UK government have released large amounts of government data and are running a public competition to gain ideas for ways of using it, with a prize of £20,000 for the best idea. Released data includes Ordnance Survey mapping information, medical information from NHS Choices, neighbourhood information from the ONS, official notices and a DEFRA carbon calculator.

There have previously been initiatives to include the public in UK government decision making, from Ken Livingstone’s appeal for public help in reducing summer tube temperatures to Boris Johnson’s recent competition to find a new routemaster, but Show Us A Better Way aims to develop public involvement on a wider scale.

The theories of Wikinomics and wisdom of crowds have found traction in private industry and since the publication of the 2005 Power Of Information report the UK government has been looking at ways of increasing public involvement in government. The speed of this has increased recently and while announcing the new ‘Strategy for world-class public services’ Gordon Brown announced that “The internet has given a powerful voice to consumers to give feedback on private-sector services - that feedback is now spreading to public services and must be embraced."

Gordon Brown also spoke around these themes at the European Google Zeitgeist:

In April the Power Of Information task force was set up to ‘drive forward the Government's pledge to meet rising aspirations of modern communications practice and improve engagement with citizens through social media.’ The Show Us A Better Way project is the first big idea to come out of this task force and since its announcement a number of bloggers have been debating it:

eg

http://slewfootsnoop.wordpress.com/2008/07/03/show-us-a-better-way

http://www.thebillblog.com/billblog/index.php/2008/07/01/we-can-show-them-a-better-way/

The opening up of public data and progression of e-government should not be party political though. We have the technology to use government data to facilitate social progress and if things like publicly accessible crime mapping can improve quality of life then they should be pursued - and government should make it as easy as possible for this to happen.

Show Us A Better Way is a good initiative, I now have to think of some ideas……….

I'm voting Republican - latest Presidential election viral gains big view numbers on YouTube

I’m Voting Republican (http://www.imvotingrepublican.com) is the latest (controversial) viral in the US Presidential election. It was not officially produced by the Democrats, it was written and directed by Charlie Steak and produced by SyntheticHuman Pictures. 'I'm voting Republican' has been a hit online and has had 2.6 million views on YouTube in just 2 weeks.

According to Hitwise, the biggest driver of visits to http://www.imvotingrepublican.com was email as people forwarded on the link and the site was ranked #17 among 659 websites in the Hitwise Politics category.

Interestingly more internet users visited imvotingrepublican.com than visited the official John McCain website over this period and this is another reminder of how powerful viral internet messages have become in US politics and the Presidential election.

Other posts on virals in the US Presidential election:

Kristi Vandenbosch video showing highlights of the primary campaign online:
http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/06/kristi-vandenbosch-video-showcasing.html

Will.i.am produces 'Yes We Can' and John McCain (john.he.is) and Ron Paul responses follow:
http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/02/william-produces-pro-obama-yes-we-can.html

5 examples of YouTube being used in the US Presidential election:
http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/01/5-examples-of-youtube-being-used-in-us.html

5 examples of how YouTube influence in UK politics is growing

YouTube influence in UK politics is growing and UK politicians are having to quickly adapt to a new way of communicating with voters. Much as politicians had to learn new techniques as TV became a mass medium, so politicians are having to adjust to be able to successfully communicate using new web channels like YouTube.

Whilst UK politics lags behind the US in utilising YouTube as a campaigning tool, parties are developing their YouTube offerings (though I think it will be a while yet before we see UK candidature / policy announcements on YouTube or 'Obama Girl' equivalents!)

Here are 5 examples of how YouTube influence in UK politics is growing:

1) Ask Gordon on YouTube

Run through the Downing Street channel, the 'Ask The PM' initiative is allowing YouTube users to upload video questions for Gordon Brown. The YouTube community then vote to establish the most popular questions and Gordon Brown has pledged to answer them on 23rd June.

2) House Of Lords on YouTube

http://uk.youtube.com/ukparliament

In an effort to engage younger generations the House Of Lords is uploading explanatory videos to the Parliament channel on YouTube. We have already seen the launch of 'Lords Of The Blog' an 'experimental blogging project to encourage direct dialogue between web users across the world and Members of the House of Lords' and a YouTube presence is the obvious next step.

Five videos have been uploaded to start things off (including 'House of Lords- what's it all about') with the promise of more to come. According to Lord Speaker Baroness Hayman, the House Of Lords hopes that the YouTube channel "will help to combat some of the outdated stereotypes of members of the upper house."

3) Webcameron

One of the first UK politicians to really embrace YouTube, David Cameron, leader of the Conservative party, continues to update his vlogging channel Webcameron. Rather than just upload policy announcements and press conference coverage, David Cameron is using Webcameron to give viewers exclusives and behind the scenes access. A good example of this is the footage that was shot around the time that Boris Johnson's London Mayor victory was announced:

http://www.youtube.com/user/webcameronuk

4) London Mayor election campaign

The London Mayor election was the first major British election conducted in a YouTube / Web 2.0 world. All the major candidates had strategy in these areas and there was some effective work, even though the audience for the message was small (the British electorate are significantly lagging the US in engaging with candidates online.)

One of the better videos was Boris Johnson's Apprentice parody:

YouTube as a campaigning tool will grow and by the time the next UK general election comes around (2009?) it will have a significant role to play.

5) Downing Street YouTube channel

The Downing Street channel on YouTube started out as hub for historic Prime Minister / government speeches and video from the Downing Street archives (eg Lloyd Georges first visit to Chequers or 'Bonar Law forms a new government.') In recent times though it has tended to aggregate the activity of Tony Blair / Gordon Brown with speeches and policy announcements making up the bulk of the DowningSt channel videos.

'Tony Blair félicite Nicolas Sarkozy (en français)' is by far the most viewed clip on the Downing Street channel with 485,809 views. After Sarkozy won the French election Tony Blair recorded a congratulatory message in French and presented it through YouTube. This has a very high view count and shows an implicit understanding of how to use YouTube effectively.

No-one has yet defined what the official Downing Street YouTube channel should be for, but the views received for Tony Blair's message to Sarkozy show how effective it an be if used properly.

All of the above point to the growing influence of YouTube in UK politics. YouTube will engage younger generations far more effectively than an MPs constituency surgery or door box generic printed material. YouTube allows a two way dialogue with youth on their terms (they can choose whether to engage and choose the timing and terms on which they do so) and against the backdrop of the US primary campaigns, the UK political establishment is starting to realise how important YouTube is becoming.

Kristi Vandenbosch video showcasing the best of the US Presidential election online activity

The US Presidential primaries have now finished and Kristi Vandenbosch has put together a great video that highlights some of the most popular viral videos and online activity from the US primary campaigns. The video features the Jack Nicholson endorsement, Obama Girl, John McCain as the Fresh prince, Hillary vs Cookies and many many others!

You can watch it here:

Kristi Vandenbosch's US presidential election online showreel from the Advertising 2.0 US conference

This showreel demonstrates how dramatically the political campaigning landscape has changed in the US, with digital (especially user generated content) now playing a major role in US elections. It also shows how far ahead online political campaigning in America is versus the UK.

I wrote a number of pieces recently about the London Mayor election and the candidates' use of online. Whilst there were a wide range of new initiatives and some commendable activity through social networks and digital channels, when you see the US Presidential campaign highlights in the video, it shows how much more potential there is for UK politicians to use online channels to capture the public imagination – though I’m not sure we'll see ‘Gordon Brown girl’ any time soon!

UPDATE - Google have also published a review of the Presidential primary elections online on the official Google blog. Titled 'Elections in the internet era' it pulls together links to a number of YouTube reviews like 'Pop Culture politics' and 'Running the 21st century campaign.' Read more here:

http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/06/elections-in-internet-era.html

Related articles on this blog:

London Mayor election review of online developments -

http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/05/london-mayor-election-online-web.html

London Mayor candidates online vs US Presidential candidates online -

http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/04/london-mayor-candidates-v-us.html

London Mayor election online - web strategy and internet developments

The London Mayor election was the first UK election where the internet had significant influence. I have written about various aspects of the online campaigns previously and thought I would summarise some of the key developments here.

Boris Johnson had the most developed online campaign. Much has been made of his election strategist, Lynton Crosby, employing a “doughnut strategy” of ruthlessly targeting Tory-leaning voters on the edge of the capital (see here for more), but below are 5 examples of online activity in the London Mayor election which are also notable:

1) London Mayor election - online hustings and questioning

Whilst there were a number of official broadcast debates, various online initiatives sought to question the candidates and engage them in a more intimate environment. YouTube was less influential than it has been in the US elections, but the principle of users posting questions online for candidates to respond to was seen in a number of places - from live webchats with the Sun (where Boris suggested he would re-look at the smoking ban) through to more structured online hustings seen on sites like Yoosk.

Yoosk London Mayor online forum (click for larger image)

2) YouGov's London Mayor election online polls proved to be more accurate than the traditional polling methods

The London Mayor election saw controversy around polls and polling methods with YouGov and IPSOS / MORI having a public debate about methodology and Ken Livingstone's campaign making an official complaint about the YouGov polls - SkyNews covered this here.

YouGov conducted six polls (using their online panels) and always showed Boris Johnson with a lead - ranging from 6% to 12%. This went against some of the other more traditional, telephone based polling of rival companies which showed a much smaller lead for Boris and at one point showed Ken Livingstone ahead by 4 points. The final YouGov poll published on Thursday morning (voting day) exactly predicted the actual result with Boris winning by 53-47%. This has prompted a press release entitled 'YouGov [online poll] gets it exactly right in Mayoral election' and offers to 'help the inquest into inaccurate telephone polls.' (full release can be seen on the Adam Boulton blog).

3) London Mayor candidates use of online media

All candidates used online extensively and social media was prominent. We saw London Mayor candidates using Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, YouTube and blogs. London Mayor candidates (with the exception of Boris) also had Google strategies (see here) and well developed campaign websites. (3 days after the election Ken Livingstone's 'Vote Ken' Google campaign is still running though...........)

The online activity supporting Boris Johnson was the most well thought out and I thought the emails sent on Wednesday and Thursday were a nice touch (even if they did get marked as 'spam' by my Gmail.)

Boris Johnson email with links to his profiles on Twitter, YouTube and Facebook
(click for larger image)

4) The LondonElects website was a great success

http://www.londonelects.org.uk/ was set up to encourage voter turn out and to provide a central, neutral, online focus point for the London Mayor election. From running an initiative to find (and part fund) an independent candidate through to offering consolidated results analysis once the election had finished, Londonelects.org.uk gained over 1 million visits and contributed to record voter turnout.

LondonElects website homepage (click for larger image)

5) London Mayor election Buzz tracking

A number of companies have tried to show case their products by applying Buzz Tracking to the London Mayor race. Systems like 'Opinion Tracker' or QDOS kept track of online buzz around the candidates and published their results. Other traffic analysis companies like Hitwise also published insight on respective candidates web traffic.

It was also possible to gain insightful information from sites like Google Trends that show you the volume of people searching for a particular candidates name:

Google Trends analysis of volume of searches for each candidate (click for larger image)

My first post about the London Mayor election predicted that it would see a new style on online campaigning in the UK
(http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/03/london-mayor-election-will-see-new.html) and I think the London Mayor candidates' online campaigns were comprehensive. I don't think it is any coincidence that the most well developed internet campaign belonged to Boris Johnson, the winning candidate.

In future UK elections I expect to see online activity further developed with increased use of behavioural targeting and opportunities such as Facebook messages targeted to users in line with their political preferences. The London Mayor campaign was a testing ground for a number of online strategies and I think the internet will be a major battleground in the next UK general election.

6 examples of Twitter use by advertisers, politicians, publishers, developers and users

This time last year there was a lot of hype around Twitter. It seemed to die down a bit, but it has recently felt like Twitter is getting a second wind and properly coming into the mainstream. Twitter do not publish official figures on number of users or regularity of updates, so there is no hard data to back up my opinion, however the Twitter Facts blog have looked at this recently and the stats they have found seem to agree.

[UPDATE: Hitwise have written about Twitter here and have noticed a significant increase in traffic in recent weeks]

Here are 6 examples that illustrate how Twitter is entering the mainstream:

1) News organisations using Twitter to extend reach

Twitter is a great way of generating feeds and a number of publishers are using it to connect with readers and highlight particular stories / discussions. US news organisations like CNN and the New York Times have used Twitter for a while, but more recently British publishers have started experimenting with Twitter. SkyNewsBoulton or GordonM (editor of Brand Republic) are good examples of how Twitter is being used to draw attention to particular articles, whilst creating a deeper engagement with viewers / readers.

Screengrab of the skynewsboulton Twitter

2) Politicians using Twitter to let voters keep track of them

The most followed Twitterer is Barack Obama with over 25,000 people following him on Twitter. In the UK London Mayor candidates Boris Johnson (http://www.twitter.com/backboris) and Brian Paddick (http://www.twitter.com/brianpaddick) have also been experimenting with Twitter to let voters know what they are doing and Downing Street (http://twitter.com/downingstreet) now have a Twitter account that they regularly update to show Gordon Brown's activity. The use of social media in politics is growing and micro-blogging politicians is an interesting development.

3) Advertisers using Twitter for engagement

In the UK the Open University are currently running a promotion with the Daily Telegraph and as part of this they are using Twitter to distribute interesting articles and insight - http://twitter.com/openuniversity

Screengrab of the OpenUniversity Twitter

Twitter.com has not accepted display advertising, but in Japan (where it has just launched a Japanese language version) Twitter.jp has decided to accept homepage advertising. "One of the first advertisers is Toyota which has a Twitter account where they talk about events and products. The [Toyota homepage display] ad directs people to a Toyota Twitter account where the users can follow the brand. Toyota can easily see who their fans are and follow what their fans are saying about them."
(http://joi.ito.com/)

Screengrab of the Toyota Japan Twitter display ad

4) Increase in Twitter spam

Twitter is now being used for spamming with a number of Twitter users starting to complain about Twitter spam. The default setting on Twitter allows anyone to start following you at any time. Twitter spam involves becoming a follower of a large number of Twitterers in a very short space of time (often thousands in a few hours.) The hope of the Twitter spammers is that users that they have added as followers will either reciprocate and start following them, or at least look at the website listed on their profile.

http://mashable.com/2008/04/14/twitter-spam-out-of-control/

The only way of preventing Twitter spam is to change the Twitter settings so that you have to personally approve each new follower, but this can be time consuming and feels against the spirit of an open community. However, the development of Twitter spam is a good indicator that Twitter is now properly established!

5) Twitter applications

There are now a large range of Twitter applications resulting from Twitter's opening of their API. Twitterers can update their Facebook status with their Tweets and various applications like Tweetscan (http://tweetscan.com/alerts.php) allow scanning of Tweets or Twitter tracking. Twitter is also popular component of Mashups and initiatives like Twittervision (http://twittervision.com) or Twittearth (http://twittearth.com) give interesting perspectives. There is even a desktop application called Twhirl (http://www.twhirl.org/) that allows Twitter to be updated from Twitterers desktops.

Screengrab of the TwittEarth application

The most talked about Twitter application currently though is Twistori, a beautifully designed application that allows people to follow Twitter updates around Love, Hate, Think, Believe, Feel and Wish.

Screengrab of the Twistori application

6) Twitter users creating Twitter projects

A number of Twitterers seem to be experimenting with Twitter projects. There doesn't seem to be any real objective to the majority of these other than curiosity and an interest in seeing what happens. A good example of this is Inwotr (http://www.twitter.com/inwotr / http://www.inwotr.com) where a Twitter user is trying to virtually travel the world through connections made through Twitter!

Twitter seems to be reaching critical mass and whilst commentators have long been predicting that Twitter will be the next big thing, I think the above examples are good indicators that Twitter will soon be properly established in the mainstream. Interested to hear of any other examples.

London Mayor elections online campaign analysis - Boris Johnson is leading on the internet

The London Mayor election is in the final week of internet campaigning. Online is playing an increasingly important role in the election strategy and there have been some interesting initiatives and developments, however the majority of prominent web trends tools still show Boris Johnson leading.

Using Yahoo! Site Explorer it is possible to examine candidates sites and see how many other sites are linking to them (this gives insight into popularity and also indicates campaign reach):

Yahoo! Site Explorer analysis of www.backboris.com - 773 pages on the site and 62,913 other sites linking to it (click for larger image)

Yahoo! Site Explorer analysis of www.kenlivingstone.com - 242 pages on the site and 14,733 other sites linking to it (click for larger image)

Yahoo! Site Explorer analysis of www.brianpaddick.org - 377 pages on the site and 20,277 other sites linking to it (click for larger image)

When analysed in this way Boris Johnson and the www.backboris.com site are the clear leaders (though when compared to www.barackobama.com's 894,000 inlinks, there may be room for further growth!)

Another measurement tool, Google Trends, is showing that London Mayor election web searches continue to increase and Boris Johnson remains the most searched for candidate:

Volumes of Google Searches for each candidate (click for larger image)

London Elects, Ken Livingstone and Brian Paddick continue to advertise with Google, seem to have increased budgets and are now making use of the Google Content Network (where ads appear on Google affiliated publisher sites as well as on Google when people search.) This appeared on my blog this morning:

Google Ads from London Elects, Ken Livingstone and Brian Paddick on my blog (click for larger image)

Boris Johnson and the Back Boris campaign are (strangely) still not using Google for advertising and even though it has not featured in their campaign to date, I am surprised that they are not making use of Search as the campaign enters its last week.

Hitwise have analysed actual internet traffic to campaign websites and have a reached a conclusion in line with the Google Trends data - Boris Johnson is receiving significantly more web traffic than the other candidates:

However not everyone agrees with the conclusion that Boris is leading online. A new system of internet reputation measurement, QDOS, combs the internet and produces a QDOS ranking that is a combination of 'Popularity, Impact, Activity and Individuality.' QDOS rates Ken Livingstone as significantly more popular than Boris Johnson online:

However the QDOS system is still in Beta (and therefore not 100% reliable yet) and when you analyse the Boris Johnson score it has a strange anomaly where he lost about a third of his ranking on one day last week?

The polls are saying that the race for London Mayor is too close to call, but online data suggests that Boris Johnson is significantly ahead of Ken Livingstone and Brian Paddick. It will therefore be very interesting to see how the online popularity of Boris Johnson translates into votes. (It will also be interesting to see if Boris finally embraces Google this week!)

FOOTNOTE:

I have previously written about:

- Online campaigning in the London Mayor Election here
- London Mayor candidates web strategy for Web 2.0 here
- London Mayor candidates Google strategy here

London Mayor Candidates v US Presidential candidates - me comparing their online strategies on Sky News!

Yesterday afternoon I received phone call from Sky News asking me to be a guest on the 'Sky.com News' evening broadcast with Martin Stanford.

click for larger image

I had never been on TV before so I was excited (and a little nervous before it), but everyone made me feel very welcome and I enjoyed the whole experience.

I was invited to discuss the online campaigns of the London Mayor candidates and contrast these with the online campaigns for the US Presidential candidates. This is the first major UK election to happen in a Web 2.0 world so I have been tracking campaigns to see how things develop. I have previously written on this blog about different elements of the online campaigns so was happy to give Sky my opinions!


In my view the most notable difference isn't necessarily the quality of what the Mayoral candidates are producing (though no-one in London has produced anything close to the Will.i.am videos seen in the US), the big difference is seen in the level of voter engagement that online has generated.

Since the success of Howard Dean's 2004 online election campaigning, US candidates have used online extensively while UK politics has lagged behind. The length of the US election process also enables activity to gradually evolve, whereas the UK's short, intensive campaigns do not give such scope for online campaign development. The differences in electoral process, coupled with relative inexperience of UK voters engaging with candidates online, is reflected in the numbers.

In the US Barack Obama has hundreds of thousands of friends and fans on Facebook (Boris leads here with just over 7,000 Facebook fans), Barack Obama is followed by 25000+ people on Twitter (Brian Paddick leads here with 300 or so followers) and London Mayor YouTube clips have been seen by hundreds rather than hundreds of thousands.

The London Mayoral election is a good testing ground for strategies that can be rolled out nationally for the next general election though and it has been interesting to see the main parties all experimenting with different ways of engaging through online channels.

Brian Paddick has recently become the first British politician to engage voters in a live UStream webcast:

Boris is making Apprentice style campaign videos:


and Ken is very focussed on using online for data capture, with this the front page of his website:

I plan to do a full review of candidates strategies over coming days and will update this post when I have a full transcript of what I said last night! [UPDATE: Sky have sent me an embed code so I have been able to include my appearance - see the video at the top of this page.] In the meantime here are some of my previous posts on the online campaigns of both US and London candidates:

London Candidates' Google strategy - here
New style of campaigning to be used in London Mayor election - here
YouTube in the US Presidential elections - here
6 Great Examples of online in the US elections - here

Are London mayor candidates making the most of the opportunities on Google?

The London Mayor election has prompted significant online activity, but with 14 days to go could the candidates be doing more with Google?

The starting point for many people searching for information online is Google. Using Google Trends it is possible to see the depth of searching around the London Mayor election. Users are searching for generic terms like 'London Mayor' as well as candidate names and volume of searching is increasing as the election nears.

This Google Trends graph shows that 'Boris' is searched for more than 'London Mayor', whilst the term 'Boris Johnson' is searched for more than 'Ken Livingstone' and enquiries for 'Brian Paddick' are negligible:

London Mayor Google Trends graph - click for larger image

On this data Boris Johnson is evidently far ahead of the other candidates in terms of voter interest and awareness - could it be that Google Trends data is a better indicator of voter intention than the opinion polls and the race is not as close as we think?

Google Trends can also show the background to Opinion Poll fluctuations. The 'Lee Jasper effect', with a significant volume of Search queries around his name, can be correlated to Ken Livingstone's recent wobble in the polls:

click for larger image - London Mayor Google Trends graph showing 'Lee Jasper effect'

So how should candidates be using this data and how can they take advantage of Google in the run up to polling day?

The volume of relevant searching on Google gives the candidates opportunities to show messages and ads alongside users' search results. Ken Livingstone is using Paid for Search on Google and to a lesser extent Brian Paddick is also pursuing this strategy.

Both Ken Livingstone and Brian Paddick are buying ads alongside searches for their names:

click for larger image - searching for 'Ken Livingstone' puts Ken's ad in top spot and a Brian Paddick ad second

click for larger image - Brian Paddick advertises on his own name, but no-one else is present

Ken Livingstone and Brian Paddick are also targeting generic searches such as 'London election' and 'London Mayor':

click for larger image - Brian Paddick in second position and Ken Livingstone in position 3

Ken is bidding on 'Boris Johnson' too and as seen below, his Adtext is aggressively targeting 'Boris Johnson' searchers with headlines like 'Boris's Bus blunder':

click for larger image - Ken targeting a search on 'Boris Johnson'

Whilst Ken Livingstone and Brian Paddick are using Google, the messages are constant rather than being updated in line with topical events and developments. Budgets also seem to run out over the course of the day with Google ads rarely showing in the evenings. There is mileage in updating Adtext daily and keeping messages relevant, whilst increasing the Search budget would allow ads to be shown throughout the day (capitalising on evening events such as the late night televised Mayoral debate.)

There is no geo-targeting applied to Ken Livingstone's ads - they are showing all over the UK. If he was to introduce London only targeting it would cut down on wastage (ie advertising to people outside London who can't vote) and would make the budget go further. With this increased budget it would then be possible to widen the list of keywords used. Currently targeting is aimed purely at terms associated with the election, however there is an untapped opportunity to position specific policies alongside relevant searches. I would have thought it productive to run ads alongside user queries such as 'London Crime', 'London Bus', 'tube', 'Oyster Card ', 'London environment' etc?

At the same time, Boris Johnson does not have any Search Engine activity at all and I think his campaign is missing a trick by not advertising on Google through Google Adwords. Boris has the most impressive website, a well developed social media plan (including Facebook , YouTube and Twitter) and could really make the most of his online presence by driving traffic through a well thought out Search Engine strategy.

As polling day approaches more and more Londoners will be searching online for information. With the polls as close as they are and rivals targeting his name, I am not sure Boris can afford to continue to ignore the advertising opportunities that Google and the other Search Engines offer?

My original post on the Mayor elections is here:
http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/03/london-mayor-election-will-see-new.html

Baidu changes homepage logo to include Barack Obama

Google have traditionally changed the logo on their home page in line with topical events (http://www.google.com/holidaylogos.html) and Chinese Search Engine Baidu are starting to change their Baidu home page logo in similar fashion

(http://shanghaiist.com/2008/04/08/is_chinese_sear.php.)

Baidu had previously featured 5 different faces on their logo (from snowstorm survivors to Hong King entertainers) and yesterday the sixth person to grace the Baidu home page logo was Barack Obama.

Clicking on the home page image took users to http://renwu.baidu.com/ which contains lots of Obama information in Chinese.

There was no official explanation of the adornment of Obama on the Baidu logo, nor was there any official endorsement of Obama by the Search Engine. Slightly surreal, but given the size of Baidu's user base this is definitely something to pay attention to over coming months!

London mayor election will see a new style of British political campaigning online

The power of crowds has been evident with a number of collaborative initiatives that have brought together likeminded online users. For example 30,000 people paid for a stake in www.myfootballclub.com which led to the group purchase of Ebbsfleet United football club and www.tribewanted.com created a combination of online community and real world sustainable tourism project on the Fijian island of Vorovoro.

To date the UK political establishment have not tapped into this trend though. In 'Politics, Policy and the Internet' (a recent publication for the Centre For Policy Studies) Telegraph journalist, Robert Colville, argues that British political parties have failed to embrace the new opportunities online (see here where you can download the pdf of his full study). Indeed the British National Party website has the same market share as all of the other UK major parties combined. He argues that the major UK political parties could reverse this by altering their mindset from “send” to “receive”, by learning the lessons of unofficial organisations such as bloggers, activists and campaign groups which have exploited the potential of the internet.

Whilst there are political blogs and sites like Webcameron, no party has truly engaged online communities in policy development. Downing St e-petitions have seen specific groups mobilised around particular issues (1 million people against roadpricing), but the UK has not seen anything similar to Estonia's 'today I decide' initiative that offered the Estonian public the chance to influence national policy and feedback on proposed new laws.

In the US Presidential elections Ron Paul and Barack Obama particularly have shown how effective the internet can be as a vehicle for raising funds and engaging supporters. Ron Paul is an interesting case because his campaign has used the internet to generate support far exceeding the original predictions for his campaign. The US electoral system means that he was always going to struggle against the more established candidates and campaign machines, however his online strategy has set the bar for online campaigning (see my previous post here: http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/02/no-other-presidential-candidate-can.html). Ron Paul and Barack Obama's online tactics could be particularly effective in a democracy with a more focussed electoral timeframe (weeks rather than months / years) and some of these strategies could be well suited to the forthcoming election for London's mayor.

The London mayoral election is the first really significant British election in a Web 2.0 world and over the next few weeks London is set to see some online political campaigning that has not been previously seen in the UK. Whilst things like Ken Livingstone's Search campaign are already running, the really interesting moves are around some of the independent candidates.

The socially progressive website www.londonelectsyou.co.uk is offering to award £50,000 to the campaign of an independent candidate. This will be awarded to the winner of a sort of online primary that www.londonelectsyou.co.uk are running, with the candidate gaining the most online votes by 18 March qualifying for the financial support.

Time Out magazine have entered their own independent candidate (Michael Hodges) into this competition and have flagged it, under the strapline of 'Vote Hodges', on the front cover of their magazine this week.

Michael Hodges is offering readers the chance to participate in the collaborative production of his London manifesto. More details can be found here: http://www.helphodges2008.com

Using public domain, online voter suggestions and feedback to influence an election manifesto is a clever idea and I'm sure the main UK political parties will start seriously investigating this sort of model for testing their own policy ideas. It is also a useful mechanism for bringing MPs closer to their constituents.

Alternatively if the UK political parties do not adopt practices of this nature, it may not be long before www.mypoliticalparty.co.uk actually becomes a reality?

FOOTNOTE:

I have also written about the Google strategies of the respective candidates here: http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/04/are-london-mayor-candidates-making-most.html

Ron Paul leads the way online, but struggles to turn this into ballot box success

Whilst the UK media debate the relative merits of the main presidential campaigns (Hillary vs Obama, McCain vs Huckabee), Ron Paul has had little coverage - eg Marketing Week's recent article here: http://www.marketingweek.co.uk/cgi-bin/item.cgi?id=59582

At the start of the campaign bookmakers ranked Ron Paul as least likely (of the 12 Republican candidates) to get the Republican nomination, however since then he has defied these odds! Despite not having the deep-pocketed backers that some of the other candidates have, Ron Paul's campaigners have proved very effective at raising money - interesting insights into campaign funding here: http://paul4prez.blogspot.com

The key to this has been the mass mobilisation of support from online communities through websites, blogs and social networks like Facebook / MySpace. Commentators may be impressed by some of the Obama online initiatives, but these are small fry in comparison to the scale of Ron Paul's online support. Ron Paul's libertarian attitude has inspired an army of full time online advocates and they have ensured that Ron Paul's message dominates the internet - with campaign badges (like the one below) turning up everywhere online:


Ron Paul supporters have been closely monitoring online activity and have been relentless in spreading the message - when Ron Paul has been discussed, supporters have been quick to leave comments. Furious Digging to push pro-Ron Paul stories to the Digg homepage has even led some to accuse Ron Paul supporters of corrupting the service / acting outside of the spirit of it! (It will be interesting to see if anyone comments on this post and, if they do, it will be interesting to see how quickly comments turn up after I have published it!)

A particularly quirky campaign technique has been for supporters to urge others to 'Google Ron Paul'. Various home-made signs and banners have encouraged people to do this - the following was posted to Flickr by Braudomatic (click image for link):



Posted to Flickr by Ian Geldard:


The volume of 'Ron Paul' results showing on Google gives the appearance of Ron Paul being a major player in the Presidential Race - Google trends shows how Ron Paul has consistently been one of the most Searched for candidates. Pushing people to Search for 'Ron Paul' on Google also allows tactical Adwords ads to be served (more insight here: http://www.infowars.net/articles/december2007/141207Zeitgeist.htm)

Many candidates have fallen by the wayside, but Ron Paul is still in the race! Whilst it looks unlikely that anything will prevent John McCain from getting the official Republican nomination, Ron Paul's ideas still seem to be influencing the GOP agenda.

The main thing that Ron Paul's campaign will be remembered for, though, is the way that it has taken online campaigning to the next level. Against all odds his relentless internet activity has resulted in the securing of significant funds and has enabled him to consistently be putting out messages that challenge the agendas of more heavily supported candidates.

Dr. No may not win, but there is no doubt that he has set the standard for online political campaigning!

Will.i.am produces pro-Obama 'Yes We Can' YouTube video - John McCain (john.he.is) and Ron Paul responses follow!

YouTube has been used consistently across Presidential campaigns so far (see http://www.nickburcher.com/2008/01/5-examples-of-youtube-being-used-in-us.html). However, in the last week a pro-Obama video called 'Yes We Can' has been viewed by massive numbers and become one of the most viewed YouTube videos of all time.

The 'Yes We Can' video was put together by will.i.am from the Black Eyed Peas and Jesse Dylan (the producer son of Bob Dylan). The video is based around Barack Obama's campaign defining Yes We Can / We Can Change speech and features a range of other stars including Scarlett Johansson, John Legend and Herbie Hancock.


Since being uploaded to YouTube the 'Yes We Can' film has been watched (across multiple postings) over 8 million times - in just 10 days! The top rated posting has 20,436 ratings, 25,518 comments and has been favorited 19,940 times!

Following the release of the Yes We Can video, a follow up has been produced called john.he.is. It 'stars' John McCain and features his comments that war in Iraq might have to be for 10,000 years. Whilst not yet in the same league of views as the Yes We Can film, john.he.is has still been viewed over 500,000 times, is increasing quickly and there is little that John McCain can do in response.


Furthermore, John McCain has also been parodied in a 'Barely Political' video called 'No, You Can't':


and finally Ron Paul supporters have come up with their own tongue-in-cheek version of the Obama 'Yes We Can' song - though its not quite as well produced......


Will.i.am spent just 48 hours putting his film together and in this short time he seems to have re-invigorated YouTube as a campaigning tool. His phenomenal 'Yes We Can' video has had incredible coverage and the parodies, remixes and online discussion show what an effect it has had. If it translates into votes then this could be a defining moment in the candidates online campaigns......

Super Tuesday Search! A big missed opportunity for traditional publishers?

Yesterday saw a massive, Worldwide news event - the 'Super Tuesday' Presidential primaries. Every UK newspaper has covered it widely with in depth analysis, snazzy graphics, free supplements and even free wall charts - all led by the perceived need to stand out on the news stand to drive readership.

There were also ways to increase traffic to publisher websiites. On 'Super Tuesday' Paid Search was a massive opportunity to drive short term gains, through monetising extra traffic, and long term gains, by increasing site profile across a truly global audience. I have used Google Trends (below) to illustrate the 'Super Tuesday' Paid Search opportunity, but few UK publishers seemed to take advantage of it and those that did seem to have been on limited budgets.

History of Searches for 'Super Tuesday' - 2 spikes - 'Super Tuesday' in 2004 election + 'Super Tuesday' in 2008
(click for larger image)

Trend showing significant Worldwide increase on 'Super Tuesday' searches over the last 7 days
(click for larger image)



Trend showing that in the 'UK region' searches for 'Super Tuesday' saw massive increase on the day
(click for larger image)

To demonstrate how easy it was to capitalise on the 'Super Tuesday' opportunity I ran my own 'Super Tuesday' Search campaign to promote a couple of relevant posts on this blog. This also gave insight into how things like bid prices, volume of searches and competitor insight changed as the day progressed.

The Sun and the Guardian newspapers ran occasional ads on Super Tuesday related keywords, along with occasional ads from US news organisations like CNN, the New York Times and the Economist. However, a number of key phrases had no advertising alongside them at all and with such low competition on these keywords generally, it was relatively easy for me to experiment with running some Paid Search ads myself!

I bought the following:

- "Super Tuesday" and variants of this phrase

- "US Presidential election" and versions of this phrase (including things like "primaries")

- candidate names

- a few random phrases linked to some of the media vehicles like "You Choose 08" and "Choose or Lose"

I ran my test on UK targeting (minimum bids on a global basis were prohibitive) and ran for 12 hours prior to and then the full 24 hours of Super Tuesday. I ran on Google, the Google site network and the Google Content network with 4 different ad texts that were served in rotation. I was often solus ad alongside these enquiries, especially as Super Tuesday traffic increased and minimum bids went up, resulting in previous advertisers becoming "Inactive for Search."

I think my campaign demonstrates how easy it is to get great coverage and exposure if you are prepared to treat one-off events in isolation. Rather than working to a definitive, average CPC across the week / month, publishers should be prepared to remove bid caps and invest more money on one-off event days like 'Super Tuesday.' Average CPC would be higher than usual as higher traffic around specific events tends to push up minimum bids, but days like 'Super Tuesday' clearly have great potential to drive traffic and encourage new users to sample.

Screengrabs from my campaign (click to see larger images):