Social Media – Trump’s Advertising Manager
http://www.govtech.com/social/2016-Presidential-Election-Circus-Is-Social-Media-the-Cause.html
The 2016 Presidential elections have reached an unprecedented peak in ubiquity, even for an event so crucial to the American populace. This year, ever growing networks such as Twitter, Facebook and Snapchat have spread news, facts and figures and an astounding number of opinions (both negative and positive) in multitude at each stage of the election. Unsurprisingly, Trump has dominated in presence through posts that span his antics both in and out of the spotlight, and to a lesser extent, his actual political silhouette.
The article describes the overwhelming social reach he has had in the past months through tweets, likes and shares, with some intriguing data from SocialFlow, such as the country having spent over a millennia worth of time (collectively) reading about the Republican Nominee online. Even more significant is the estimate of the $380 million equivalent of social spread he has achieved without spending a cent (although not much being positive).
Experts say that social media’s influence in this election has been stronger than ever before, and that this trend of its increasing presence will continue into future electoral campaigns. The interesting idea of a “feedback loop” is discussed – a lynchpin effect where one posts rapidly snowball from their source (the candidates) to various venues (the different social networks) and continually diffuse outward. Trends have shown that this is not only due to the widespread popularities of outlets such as Facebook and Twitter, but also more “effective” (either unintentional or intentional) use by candidates.
While a majority of what has been said about Trump has slowly chipped away at his image, the omnipresence of these opinions through media has ensured that his name will not be forgotten for years to come.