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Quote of the Week:

Politicos using social media: who gets it, who doesn't

A quick survey of two world powers shows me that the Brits know how to use social networking [twitter] [flickr] , and while the Yanks have twitter, it's pretty dang dry. Also, while he has an equally-passive Facebook page, W doesn't have a flickr page. WTF?

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Here's the Prime Minister's Twitter:

Content evaluation: lots of banter, and answering of questions from other twitterers. A

Design Crit: the use of a black background and the choice of a cropped photo showing the iconic "10" address numbers on the Prime Minister's door is very British. Understated and stylish. B+

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And the White House's:

Content evaluation: dry dry dry listings of press releases, and events. D

Design Crit: The pale blue background is weak. No read, white, and blue? No american flag? Soaring eagle? The image of the President being used is incongruous with the screen name "TheWhiteHouse"...is it a place (where the stream is reporting on not only the actionsof the President, but all of the Executive Branch), or is it a person (the President)? Demerits for the bad photoshopped-in background behind W's head, as well. Let's get consistent, people! D+

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For the comparison, here's Obama's twitterstream:

Content evaluation: this is somewhere in-between: it's mostly a marketing tool to raise awareness for the events on his campaign schedule. I haven't seen his twitterstream answer questions from others, although he does use it to drive readers to other social and interactive media, where they are (by self-selection) comfortable absorbing more information. I think the Obama camp could learn something from the PM in terms of talking to the people, though. B-


Design Crit: repeating the visual mark in the background and in the user icon...good, but perhaps a bit repetitive? And I know that Barack Obama is the brand, it wouldn't hurt to humanize the branding a bit with a photo of Barack's face for the icon. Let the logo work in the background image. B

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Stats of Twitter followers*:

• downingstreet: 3,504


• TheWhiteHouse: 569


• BarackObama: 51,402

hmmm, who is reaching out to, and connecting with, the online community?

*(and before I get mail about not including John McCain's stats here, believe me, I looked for him on Twitter. He's just not there.)

Labels: branding, politics, social networking

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