Social Media, 2012 Elections and community facts

We’re just 1 year away from the 2012 election. It’s time to start looking at how social media anticipates the event and learn a few tricks on how to connect and influence various communities with a worthy cause.

It wouldn’t be much fun to do the analysis within the politics tribe. So instead, we’ll look at how the coming election is talked about within the LGBT, feminism, economics, sustainability and religion communities. eCairn aggregates the conversations from influencers within each of those distinct tribes.

First, the numbers (stats about the 2012 elections within those tribes):

Next, the graphs (volume of conversations on 2012 elections over time):

LGBT

Feminism

Economics

Sustainability

Religion

The volume of conversations is going up slowly. After all, we’re still 1+ year away. Most upticks of volume are in reaction to crisis or comments that were put in context of the election (like raising the debt ceiling in July)

Over the period analyzed, the volume peaks at a different point in time for each tribe. Our graphs point to some noteworthy moments which reflect the specific interests of the tribe. For example:

• The heated debate about raising the debt ceiling for Economics in May.
• Multiple statements about gays issued by GOP members for LGBT in August.
• Comments on EPA, Climate change from GOP leaders for Sustainability in August.

Last, the clouds (2012 election conversations processed through eCairn expression-driven text analytics)

LGBT: Same-sex Marriage + Bachmann
Feminism: Mostly the election+ Bachman/Palin/Romney/Perry

Economics: Debt ceiling + Perry/Romney

Sustainability: Oil and gas + no GOP candidates

Religion: Mostly the election + Romney/Bush

Conclusion:  Though the debate is mostly around the election and the candidates, it’s possible to see through their conversations that each tribe has a unique filtering system for what’s important as it relates to the cause they want to fight for. Campaign managers and staff should read social media through the lenses of tribes both in terms of who and what has influence.