Political Party social media stats – National playing Dirty Politics on social media as well?

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The Daily Blog
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Interesting data from friend of the blog, Marty Stewart, on social media likes and it shows an interesting question that post Dirty Politics should probably get asked…

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…it’s interesting that Key has so many personal followers.  One wonders if those are all real followers or if there has been some dirty politics to boost the numbers?

The Greens are the masters at social media in terms of a political brand and Internet MANA  are better placed than National and Labour.

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5 COMMENTS

  1. Most people know that I am loyal to the progressive left, but I have to say something here out of fairness.

    Looking at the people on the rundown, with the exception of the Green Party Leaders, (and I think that Meteria so ROCKS, even though I am a David Cunliffe lad), the only person who has been in the public eye for any time is Winston. Key has been Prime Minister for 6 years or so, and in that time has had a lot of media coverage.

    On top of that, like it or not, a lot of people honestly believe that Key has done a good job. Of course, we look around at New Zealand today, and we can see how he has done for ourselves, but too many people – the majority for all too long – have bought into the charm. (Time to show the disasters with our own policies I think).

    As well as this, many people will friend and then forget. Also, many on the left will friend opposition people to watch what they are up to. I had a look, and for me, I have 66 friends on FB out of 534 who like this page. That is over 10% of my friends also like the ‘John Key’ FB page. I note that many are political activists on the left, or even Candidates, though some are definitely Nat supporters. (There are some good ones out there).

    As such, what I am saying is that this may be accurate and fair. It seems way out of whack, but it shows nothing in my view. Clare Curran recently hit the 4,000 friends mark on her personal page and had to set up a politician page for example. For https://www.facebook.com/simon.buckingham.labour which is my Candidate page, I am on only 183 likes, but it has only been going since 3 July. Therefore, I am not sobbing into my coffee right now that nobody loves me, though I am shamelessly plugging my Candidate page on TDB!

    As such, Key is going to get those abroad who want to learn about New Zealand and so friend the PM, not because he is National, but because he is our global representative. We also have our people watching him, his people supporting him, and the fact that he has been going for years.

    Nah. I reckon that this is high, but can be explained. Even if it is inordinately high, it does not actually mean much. What does count is getting our positive messages as to how we will build a better and more socially inclusive New Zealand over the next decade as a progressive left coalition, working together. What really counts is the week after 20 September where I find out if we do get 70% or so of the Party vote, putting Simon Buckingham into Parliament! Well – I can dream, can’t I?

  2. I hve been wondering if somebody is gaming vote compass. On friday morning DC had won the debate but by 6pm JK had. Also other online polls seemed to change dramatically over the course of a few hours. I’m not wearing a tinfoil hat but it makes me wonder.

    • Of course they are. Everyone does, which is why online polls are basically meaningless. I regularly see links in my FB feed from the left groups I’ve subscribed to, encouraging everyone to shift an online poll. I have no doubt that right leaning groups do the same.

  3. Liking a page or even a single post doesn’t actually indicate support in many cases. I think that as we become more versed in the interactive aspect of social networking applications, people are becoming more sophisticated in their used of these features. These statistics say little about the individual motivation of likers. However, I believe they do show us something that those of us working at the grassroots level of politics need to be a lot more aware of: the issue of visibility.

    These statistics show how visible individuals and groups are within this specific social networking environment, and potentially indicate how successful the drive to make John Key the face of National has been. While the Greens have been successful in their use of social networking sites such as Facebook to some extent, clearly more traditional forms of PR/advertising are still playing a vital role in building campaigns and getting important messages out to the general public. Recently I’ve seen a number of actions that have tried to focus on Facebook/Twitter/etc to build momentum, and the vast majority have failed to get the groundswell needed to create real change. Bottom line, likes frequently do not materialise into real action. Something that many who live and breath the modern connected environment often forget.

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