As I mentioned in my previous post, myself and the team at Edelman have been monitoring the use of Twitter by Australian politicians and their staffers at – Election.TweetLevel.com.au. On the whole it has been rather uneventful. The majority of the politicians are simply ignoring the platform and social media more broadly for that matter.

But all of this took a turn this week, when Prime Minister, Julia Gillard, started engaging. The initial impetus was the offer of a charity donation in exchange for a @reply by Karalee Evans and another staffer at digital agency Amnesia Razorfish. Check out the full story here.

Following this initial engagement, JG has been replying regularly to Tweets she is receiving, including a message to yours truly.

In response to this message:

Julia Gillard sent this response:

Obviously, social media will not be the only thing that wins or loses this election, but it will have an impact. So Julia engaging in my mind is a very good thing. Jim Macnamara commenting on this in a SBS News story tonight summed it up best:

No one thing will cause people to vote, not newspapers, not TV debates, not social media, but does social media have a role? Yes.

I couldn’t agree more with Jim. Social media does have a role to play. If most politicians continue to ignore it they are missing a trick. Follow this link to view the SBS story, which in addition to Jim, includes an interview with myself and Karalee Evans.

What do you think? Do you care if our politicians are engaging on Twitter? Do you think their time would be better spent on Facebook? Or should simply stick to traditional media?

Election 2010 offers politicians the opportunity to embrace an ever-maturing portfolio of social media platforms to engage with Australian voters, but sadly most are simply using social media platforms to push out their messages in a one way direction.

Myself and the digital team at Edelman Australia have been working on some research in the lead up to the election that aims to measure the Twitter activity of Australia’s politicians and staffers and provide a rank on who is the most influential. Check it out at the dedicated site we have set up – election.tweetlevel.com.au

Methodology

To track Twitter’s influence on the election, we have input all the politicians we could find into Edelman’s TweetLevel tool, which measures the influence of individuals on Twitter based on a number of factors including re-tweets, followers, frequency of tweets, references etc. We have included a detailed overview of how the tool calculates the scores on the site.

The results

Currently the top ten most influential political Tweets are:

The findings at the moment show that the Greens are using the platform most effectively with a large section of Greens MPs and candidates using the tool effectively to communicate and engage with potential voters.

The top two positions on the table are controlled by former party leaders Malcolm Turnbull and Kevin Rudd. Malcolm is effectively using the platform to engage with his followers and tweets regularly. Kevin Rudd on the other hand has secured his position largely due to the huge following he has (close to 1 million followers), and updates his account sparingly and engages in virtually no two way dialogue via @replies.

Both PM contenders Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott feature highly on the influence score, but this is due in main part to the high number of followers and the high number of re-tweets they are generating. Disappointingly, both candidates are only using their Twitter channels to push content as opposed to using it to engage with Australian voters. Both engagement scores are woefully low.

Will the battle for votes be won by Twitter?  Not this time it seems, but Twitter’s influence on the conversation and its use as a political organising tool cannot be underestimated.

We will be updating the Election.TweetLevel.com.au site on a regular basis over the course of the election campaign, so check in regularly if you want to stay up to date.

Another site that is tracking politicians’ use of social media during the election is The Social Election, which has been set up by digital agency Amnesia social media guru Karalee Evans. It is well worth checking out as well.

Any feedback you have on the research we are undertaking would be very much appreciated. If you would like to discuss it with me don’t hesitate to get in contact with me via the contact form on this site or via Twitter – @matthewgain

Source - Nielsen

According to independent studies by Nielsen and Meltwater, Nike has stolen a march on official sponsors by generating the most buzz online in the lead up to the World Cup. This fact has been lauded high and low by a range of media houses including the FT in Europe, Yahoo 7 in Australia and USA Today in the US. Yet in my opinion this research risks misrepresenting the efforts of the other players.

Few of the articles drill into the methodology employed to generate the results and the time period when the study was conducted greatly favours Nike’s World Cup campaign.

This post is not designed to prove the research wrong, but rather to put it into context and explore some of the reasons why Nike may have outperformed those further down the table.

For the purpose of this post I conducted a review of the methodology used in the research and reviewed the marketing activity of the top five ranked brands  in the study to understand why Nike had won so convincingly. Note this research was not exhaustive.

I intend to post my research of the official sponsors in a series of updates this week here on my blog.

As I struggled to find much information about the Meltwater study, beyond this post, and the fact the findings were similar to the Nielsen study, for the purposes of this post I decided to focus only on the Nielsen findings.

Research findings:

Research Methodology:

Nielsen’s study, conducted between May 7^th to June 6^th 2010, looked at English language World Cup-related messages on blogs, message boards, groups, video and image sites – including Flickr, YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter – that mentioned at least one of the 10 official FIFA partners and sponsors with a global footprint or two of their top competitors (30 brands in all).

Things to note about the methodology:

The problem with the methodology and the study for me is that it risks readers assuming that all brands were actively attempting to generate online buzz in the lead up to the event.

Nike’s World Cup video was launched on 17 May, meaning it benefited from 29 days of the survey period. Adidas’s Star Wars inspired World Cup video and its official World Cup video were launched on 4 June and 9 June respectively. Thus the research period accounted for only two days of the Star Wars video, whilst Adidas’s official World Cup video did not feature at all in the period.

The other thing to note is the fact that official sponsors will typically hold their big efforts until the tournament proper and an ambusher will always attempt to steal the early lead.

My view on the research:

Without a doubt Nike has done an amazing job generating buzz in the lead up to the World Cup, however as I have noted Nike was advantaged in this study by the favourable research period and the fact that the tournament hasn’t truly started.

I expect online buzz to increase as activity by official sponsors commences during the tournament. The tournament is a long way from being over, so are the opportunities for official sponsors to grow buzz and association from their sponsorships.

Irrespective you can’t argue about the success of Nike’s campaign and strategy of being involved with Football. Interestingly the success of the Nike video also highlights that plenty of people are still willing to be influenced and talk about a traditional advertising style piece of video content.

What do you think? Will the other brands build their momentum, or are their strategies and tactics missing the mark?

Come back through the week, to read my reviews of the official and unofficial brand’s activity in relation to the World Cup.

In a follow up to the Adidas video announcing its Star Wars range Adidas has launched a World Cup video inspired by the Star Wars series. Recreating the famous Star Wars bar scene on Tatooine the video incorporates David Beckham, Noel Gallagher and Snoop Dogg among others.

An obviously expensive affair, the video leaves me a bit cold. There is no twist on the original Star Wars scene. I was waiting for something quirky or interesting to happen, but it never really came. Nowhere near the passion and excitement of the Nike World Cup video. Maybe there is more to come, but after the the first Adidas Star Wars video, which prompted me to publish a post back in January, a bit of a let down for me.

Check it out below – what do you think? At the bottom of the post is the first Adidas Star Wars video – which I thought was kick ass..

Here is the original Star Wars video again:

How cool is this video by Google highlighting the speed of its Chrome browser. My fav is the potato one.

I know I am a little late on this one, but so good it is still worth posting.

HT – Neville Hobson.

UPDATE – OPERA HAS RESPONDED WITH THIS VIDEO BELOW:

Thanks to Jordy for this via the comment box.

To build buzz for the launch of its new phone, Kin, Microsoft has been undertaking a fairly large scale new media campaign involving live events, a range of social platforms including, YouTube and  Facebook, and a tour of America that explores the concept of a ‘friend’ in today’s society.

The work, which I believe has been created by Exposure, is in my opinion refreshingly good and a welcome departure from previous Microsoft social media marketing attempts like the Windows 7 launch video party series (although ironically the views of these videos far outstrip the Kin ones).

The campaign launched in April and will include 15 webisodes starring Rosa, a likeable personality who is travelling across America to meet in person her friends on Facebook, MySpace and Twitter.

The webisodes in my opinion are good. They are professionally created and engaging. The integration of multiple social media platforms has also been done well and two way engagement is going on across all of the ones I have viewed. The campaign has now launched another phase involving a series of live music events with bands such as The Black Keys.

Below I have embedded a couple of examples of the webisodes and also given a quick overview of the campaign elements and why I think this campaign has been successful.

This is the trailer to the series:

An example webisode:

Campaign elements (all numbers roughly accurate at time of posting):

• Facebook – more than 187,000 people have liked the page and there is lively discussion going on via the wall. There are customised tabs for competitions. Videos and live events are also being publicised via the wall.
• YouTube – a branded channel has been set up that has 3,130 subscribers (this isn’t huge), but has generated close to 600,000 views.
• Twitter – the account has 4,487 followers and is being used to promote gigs and events happening in American cities. It is also being used for conversation and questions are being actively responded to.
• MySpace – A highly customised page showcasing the webisodes as the hero content
• Live events – live music events are taking place all over America, but to find out the details you have to be following the channels mentioned above to get clues and information
• Microsite – this is the online hub for the campaign. Links off to all the social platforms and also provides more detailed information about the product.

What I like about this campaign:

• Microsoft is everywhere its audience is. It has recognised that people interact on different platforms for different reasons and that no single platform is the answer. Refreshingly as well, Microsoft is playing on its competitors’ platforms (Youtube in particular) and not trying to confine this to their own platforms. Nice.
• The videos are highly produced and engaging. The video quality is good and the talent obviously well thought out. Rosa is excellent natural talent that I found incredibly likeable. The initial trailer was obviously well promoted (165k) views, but subsequent videos were much less so – typically around the 5K mark, which must be somewhat disappointing.
• The product mentions are not in your face. The Kin phone is present in each video, but where it is used it is relevant, not obtrusive and natural. Congratulations on this Microsoft.
• The campaign involves online and offline elements. The offline elements give people something to engage with and offer situations for the public to generate and share content around the brand.
• Microsoft is engaging in a two way dialogue. Across the Twitter and Facebook pages it is clear Microsoft is responding to questions and engaging in the conversation.

It will be interesting to see how Microsoft and its agencies continue to capitalise on the momentum they have generated thus far, but roughly a month in they appear to be off to a good start. I am not entirely sure about the phone, but I am only going on some reviews I have read and the form factor. I guess time will tell on that point.

What do you think?

If you enjoyed this post why don’t you subscribe to my blog via RSS or email by following this link. Follow me on Twitter or connect on LinkedIn.

Full disclosure, I am a former employee of Microsoft and Microsoft is a client of both Weber Shandwick and my new employer Edelman. However Microsoft or its agencies have had no involvement in this post.

What a brilliant idea.

HT – Jack Schofield

Forrester Analyst Mary Beth Kemp, has posted on her blog the graphic below outlining ways CMOs can be leading the integration of social across an entire organisation.

The role for the CMO in social

Following from the graphic I posted earlier in the week, I thought this was an excellent tool to break down the complex area of social into bite size chunks that are understandable and actionable.

It is worth noting that Mary points out in her post that whilst the CMO should be ultimately responsible for driving social, activity should be split across the entire organisation, which I couldn’t agree with more.

The only problem for me with this graphic, as commenters pointed out in my last post, is that this only looks at social from an external marketing point of view. Of course I understand that this has been created with CMOs in mind, but there is enormous benefit for using social from an internal point of view as well. Your employees can be amazing external advocates for your organisation if they are happy and given the right education.

Thus the addition I would make is an internal comms component. I think this would fall in the embrace section and should be in the form of an internal only community for discussion and education. Do you agree?

Social Media Roles

Funnily enough it is often determining where social media should sit within an organisation that is one of the biggest barriers for companies adopting it.

Above is a clever little graphic that I have seen posted in a few places on the web over the last couple of days (strangely it isn’t attributed to anyone, but I found it here) that goes some way to explaining where and how to integrate.

What I like most about this graphic is the simple way it breaks down the multiple departments where social media can and should fit and the responsibilities for those departments.

Of course each organisation would need to tweak this according to their company structure, but this is a damn good template with which to start that process.

Missing for me is the HR department and also the product development departments.

HR should be involved to answer reactive questions related to recruitment and should also be using social media to proactively fill roles.

Product development should be involved to receive feedback on products and services and also to crowd source ideas for new products.

What do you think? Anything else missing, or worth editing?