The California governor candidates are obviously in this race to win and win big. One of the most fascinating aspects of this race to me is how furiously the candidates have gotten technology religion. Being a technology advocate, I can attest to the effectiveness of online campaigns, especially as they compare to the ineffectiveness these days of traditional offline media of print, radio and TV. A Forrester research survey reported that 60% of marketers will shift their traditional marketing budget to interactive [online] marketing.
Celebrities, radio station, institutions and individuals who offer services are now moving to online media marketing. And those who know how to do it right, have successfully built a brand online and was able to interact with their fans, customer, consumers and users. Anyone can almost get an immediate feedback about what they offer.
We all have witnessed the power of social media when President Barack Obama took over the White House. And this is clearly a test to all California governor candidates to see if they can repeat what happened in 2008. “Speak and ye shall hear,” these famous words from the The Book of Job are aptly suited to define what Internet social networks are.
The use of technology has completely changed the landscape of political campaigning forever. In the old days, California governor candidates would have produced and mailed campaign brochures, gotten their message printed in newspapers and scheduled speeches. Oftentimes this required months of planning and hundreds of thousands of dollars or more.
We witnessed how social networking and blogging have influenced a lot of people’s decision and kind of thinking about any topic. Celebrities like Britney Spears, John Mayer, Oprah and Ellen DeGeneres even have a team in order to get to the trend of online social media. Today, you can write about any topic and expect to be read and get feedback in an instant.
The field of California governor candidates are no slouches either. In fact, a couple of them have reached “celebrity” status themselves. Gavin Newsom has 1.1 million Twitter followers and Jerry Brown somewhere in the 900,000 range. These numbers put the politicians on par with real celebrities like Paula Abdul (ex-American Idol) and John Legend.
At this moment, it’s safe to say that there’s an inverse relationship between the success of online marketing and campaign expenditures. Meg Whitman who spent $900,000 and Steve Poizner who spent $100,000 on their campaign, both Republicans, have the least number of votes by a factor of several thousand percent! What does this mean? Did they failed to take advantage of technology or simply they just have the wrong message? It’s far too soon to tell perhaps.
There’s a big challenge to all California governor candidates. The challenge is not to get the most followers on Twitter or most number of friends on Facebook. America has a budget deficit of $26 Billion, an unemployment rate of 12% an unfavorable business environment, and California’s education tanking, more and more employers and families are moving elsewhere…. these are the challenges. And the challenges cannot be solved by your celebrity status.