Campaign 2010 Races to Watch: Senate Edition October 20, 2010

As Election Day nears, candidates for elected office across the country are using
Facebook to communicate and engage authentically with voters as well as organize
supporters in ways unimaginable a decade ago. As you plan your daily political coverage,
we hope you'll consider including our campaign watchers' snapshots of House, Senate,
and Gubernatorial contenders that are making the most of Facebook.

Over the next two weeks, we'll be serving up races to watch and Facebook data for the
House (Tuesdays), Senate (Wednesdays) and Governorships (Thursdays).
Race of the Day

Two Candidates, Two Parties, Same Social Media Strategy

In a heated California Senate race where recent polls show a razor thin margin of one to
three percentage points, incumbent Democratic Senator Barbara Boxer and Republican
challenger Carly Fiorina have taken a similar social media strategy: Focus on campaign
participation and donation.

With less than two weeks until Election Day, it appears the candidates have turned
much of their communications away from the issues and toward building enthusiasm
and influencing voter turnout.

Fiorina is running a Facebook campaign encouraging her supporters to recruit their

friends to support her campaign. Fiorina, who currently has 18,301 supporters, has a
set a goal of boosting her supporter total on Facebook to 20,000. She has
approximately 900 new fans in the past week. Fiorina leads her Facebook page with an
"Action Center" focused on encouraging participation in her campaign. Last week,
Fiorina raised more than $100,000 in 24 hours with her "Retire Barbara Boxer Money
Bomb" campaign.

Boxer, who has more than 39,000 supporters on Facebook, also is using the site focus
on campaign donations, joining and volunteering for the campaign ad visiting the
campaign store.

Boxer has developed a "I donated to Boxer 2010" virtual campaign button that
supporters can put on their personal Web page. The Boxer campaign has only penned
eight wall posts in the past week, with three focused on campaign donations and one
detailing how to order yard and outdoor signs.
It will be interesting to watch in the final 12 days to see if the candidates move to a
more issues-focused campaign to convince last minute swing voters or if they continue
their focus on ensuring that the supporters they already have show up on November 2.

Just the Data

Gaining Momentum (Largest increase of fans since last week)

1. Ron Johnson (Republican/Wisconsin) -- +6,468
2. Sharron Angle (Republican/Nevada) -- +4,427
3. Dino Rossi (Republican/Washington) -- +3,694
4. Christine O'Donnell (Republican/Delaware) -- +1,530
5. Rand Paul (Republican/Kentucky) -- +1,320

Top Landslides (Biggest fan gap between opponents)

1. Florida: Mark Rubio (R) +106,191 fans than Rep. Kendrick Meek (D) and +6,916 fans
than Gov. Charlie Crist (Ind).
2. Nevada: Sharron Angle (R) +81,978 fans than Sen. Harry Reid (D)
3. Kentucky: Rand Paul (R) +73,311 fans than Jack Conway (D)
4. Louisiana: Sen. David Vitter (R) +29,259 fans than Rep. Charlie Mellancon (D)
5. Washington: Dino Rossi (R) +28,272 fans than Sen. Patty Murray (D)

Top Posters (Most campaign wall posts in the past week)

1. Sen. Harry Reid (Democrat/Nevada) -- 61
2. Christine O'Donnell (Republican/Delaware) -- 33
3. Rep. Kendrick Meek (Democrat/Florida) -- 30
3 (tie). Rep. Mark Kirk (Republican/Illinois) -- 30
5. Scott McAdams (Democrat/Alaska) -- 27

U.S. Politics on Facebook

Don't forget to check out our U.S. Politics on Facebook page for the latest social media
insights from the campaign trail.

Sincerely,
The Facebook Political Team