Social Media in Comparison: Cuccinelli vs Shannon
So now that the election is over, and Virginians have overwhelmingly voted Ken Cuccinelli as their new Attorney General, let’s take a look back at the campaign operations, not poll or fundraising numbers, let’s look at Cuccinelli’s and Shannon’s effectiveness in social media engagement.
Since the 2008 Presidential election, engaging prospective voters through social media websites has become an important priority for campaigns and candidates. If you visit any campaign website these days, you’re more than certain to find a link to that candidate’s Facebook profile, Twitter page, YouTube page, etc.
That was the case with Cuccinelli and Shannon. For this post only, we will compare the Facebook and Twitter profiles of these two former opposing candidates for Attorney General.
On Facebook, Ken Cuccinelli’s personal profile page has 2,883 friends in total. His Facebook fan page has a total of 3,023 supporters.
Steve Shannon on the other hand has 1,106 friends on his personal profile page. His Facebook fan page has 1,861 fans in total.
Now on Twitter, Cuccinelli has 844 followers, and is himself only following 5 people. He’s updated his Twitter profile 68 times throughout the campaign.
Shannon on the other hand has 936 followers, but he’s following 1,394 people as well. He’s updated his status 75 times throughout the campaign.
What meaning can we form from these numbers? Republicans, Cuccinelli’s supporters known for being less technology connected as evident from the 2008 elections have made a 360 in terms of online engagement. On both mediums, Cuccinelli out Facebooked, and out Twittered Shannon.
Republicans we’re excited in Virginia this time around, and they showed it through social media online.
