The latest opinion polls show that the outcome of the General Election is far from decided—and each political party is working down to the wire to attract more voters. Young people are an important demographic within the UK but only had a 44 per cent turn out in the last election. Given the role social media played within the last US election – Facebook introduced a ‘I’m voting’ button amongst other social experiments – it is no surprise that the key to winning this election is likely to come down to which party is able to effectively engage younger voters on social media.
Many are still debating who is currently leading the digital race, and based on Obama’s previous success (utilising social and digital to victory), Labour seems to be fighting fit. Having recruited the masterminds from across the pond, Labour’s online youth consultation engaged the youth population online and received over 1,500 responses.
The Liberal Democrats on the other hand are taking a more tactical approach utilising its NationBuilder and voter contact database Connect. After putting all its Twitter followers into an email list to target those with the highest Klout score, they have been able to build relationships with the most socially influential people.
These examples show that utilising social channels could give parties a critical edge over other candidates, and create advocates from passive voters. From peer-to-peer recommendations, to good old-fashioned customer service, parties need to think carefully as to how they are addressing their social strategies.
Online communities
Creating online forums, addressing queries and truly connecting with supporters should be a key part of every leading political party’s tactics. Changing opinions and winning votes is cutthroat and harsh. Other parties will be going out of their way to undermine, mock and discredit opponents’ campaigns so they all need to be at the top of their game to fight for their share of voters.
Tactics such as online communities are a great way of addressing voters on a personal basis by creating a forum where they can interact, rate referendums and have queries answered by a representative. Given that 75 per cent of people view customer service (or constituent responsiveness in the realm of politics) as a competitive differentiator, an online community should go hand-in-hand with any digital strategy.
Peer-to-peer recommendations
Political parties must also recognise that creating political advocates is worth more than any big marketing campaign. In fact Facebook’s political specialist for EMEA, Elizabeth Linder, recently stated that peer-to-peer recommendations were going to play a key role within the 2015 election thanks to the growing importance of social: “People are going to be turning to their friends for the kind of advice and inspiration on who to vote for. The magic is in the power of the influence of friends”.
Similarly, the Edelman Trust Barometer found that only 14 per cent of users trust advertising. Therefore, using a combination of tactics with social at the heart may be better at creating happy, loyal voters who will recommend their chosen party to a friend. These days, you just can’t buy that kind of advocacy.
Historically, the UK has seen a disconnect between politicians and people, however this election has seen the power of digital begin to bridge that divide. With voter turnouts at an all time low, social media has the ability to reengage the ‘checked out’ voters through personalisation (online communities) and third party endorsements (peer-to-peer recommendations). Social will be a key tactic for the winning party - watch this space.
By Fabrice Etienne, EMEA Marketing Director at Lithium Technologies.
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