Daily Download: Obama Spent 10 Times as Much on Social Media as Romney

This video laid out how much the Obama campaign spent on digital spending in comparison to
the Romney campaign and just how effective it was. Daily Downloads Lauren Ashburn and
Howard Kurtz explain how the Obama campaign spent 47 million dollars on social media
advertising, while the Romney campaign spent about a tenth of that at 4.7 million dollars. Both
parties used Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and more to advertise themselves. Romneys campaign
was a little late in the game, that is, the Obama campaign had been much more involved on
social media and longer than the Romney campaign. It certainly paid off too, since Obama won
the election. The Romney campaign had initially set up an online database called Orka, that
was supposed to identify people who were voting, and those who werent voting in order to
lobby those who werent voting, however, Okra crashed and failed.
Through social media, politics have blown up and have become a lot less private. About twentyfive percent of Obama voters identified themselves as voting for Obama, and twenty percent of
Romney voters identified themselves as voting for Romney. In doing this, friends and family of
those self-identified voters were encouraged to vote for the same candidate, or at the very least
get out there and vote. Because people were posting about who they voted for, and articles and
ads that were related to their votes, many other people shared those articles via Facebook and
Twitter, causing more and more people to vote; some people even unfriended those who they
did not share similar political views with, according to Lauren Ashburn. The majority of the
people who were lobbied online via social media to vote, about forty-five percent, were of the
age group 18 to 29 years old, and about eleven percent of people over the age of 65. This video
proved that social media is a great way to get people to start talking politics in a friendly way!
Social media is a new method to acquire votes for an election. This concept is demonstrated in
the online video, Daily Download: Obama Spent 10 Times as Much on Social Media as
Romney. Daily Downloads Lauren Ashburn and Howard Kurtz discuss the differences in
digital media campaign spending between President Obama and Mitt Romney. In the 2012 U.S
election President Obama spent forty seven million dollars on advertisements on social media
sites, such as Twitter and Facebook, whereas Mitt Romney spent four million and seven
hundred thousand dollars. President Obamas digital campaign spending exceeds Mitt
Romneys spending by tenfold. The correlation between social media and Obamas successful
campaign, suggests voters are being influenced by social media. Other factors, such as voter
identifying who they are voting for, are encouraging friends and family to vote for the same
candidate. Twenty five percent of Obama voters, in the age group eighteen to twenty five,
identified as Obama voters, whereas only twenty percent of Romney voters self identified. As
well as eleven percent of people over the age of sixty five identified the candidates they voted
for on social media. Lauren Ashburn and Howard Kurtz bring a unique perspective on the role
social media plays in elections, and the rising importance of a strong digital campaign.