Quotable quote:
“No part of the education of a politician is more indispensable than the fighting of elections.” – Winston Churchill
The Parliament is well, hung…
At the time of writing Australia is in the unique position of having a hung parliament.
During the course of the election, we have seen an enormous amount of media coverage and analysis about the appeal of the two major parties to the electorate. Several things that stood out in this election, the first of which has been and to reflect very bold viral campaign developed in response to competition on Q and A to encourage young voters.
Appearing on Youtube Tony Vs Julia superimposes the heads of Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott on top of characters from action movies. Julia and Tony seek to destroy each other, yet there is some unresolved sexual tension that appears to mimic real-life.
The call to action is to have your say in what might be one of the most action-packed elections of all time. Terrific stuff…
However, the actual political campaign has been an astonishingly negative series of attacks around policies centred around the middle ground, leaving a very dissatisfied community.
This election has seen in some quarters audience participation like never before thanks to social media and in particular Twitter. A search on the hashtags #ausvotes #Qanda (just type these into Google) as well as various politicians twitter pages such as @turnbillmalcolm @TonyAbbottMHR @JuliaGillard and monitoring services such as election.ly demonstrates the huge volume of online commentary around this election. Take a look at TweetMP to see how active politicians are.
If you have been watching Q and A you will have seen the tweets appearing at the base of the screen during the shows. Whilst this has been annoying to some, it has been in terrific source of interaction and as a result compelling viewing for many in the Twitter community.
As Bill Clinton once stated, “the people have spoken, we now need to understand what they said”. It seems to me that we have seen the strongest indication yet of the mounting resentment towards the nature of today’s politics including the aggressive manner in which politicians treat each other, particularly during question time that seems to be so out of kilter with the expectations of those people who politicians seek to serve.
So, you may be asking what has this got to do with helping you use social media in your business?
So, you may be asking what has this to do with helping you use social media in your business?
As much as anything it is about understanding. If you know where people who use social media tools are most engaged it helps you determine where it may fit in your Digital Strategy. In much the same way as search engine optimisation is vital to create Google space, Twitter and social media are all about tapping in and contributing to conversations whether it be positive or negative ones and this can have a large pass on effect.
What should you do
The first thing to do is dip a toe in the water. This may include setting up a Twitter account, setting up a Facebook page, improving and becoming much more interactive with Linked In and in particular being focused on what you publish being related to your area of expertise.
For example, a colleague of mine uses Twitter to advertise IT jobs. He is now substantially reducing his cost of advertising those same jobs on Seek and achieving good results.
If you need help to get started you can sign up for our Social Media Kickstart package, where we take care of this for you.
