Inside The Beltway: Facebook Is To Politico As Twitter Is To National Journal
Guest post by Jeff Mascott, the Managing Partner of Adfero Group, a Washington, DC-based public relations firm. He also teaches at Georgetown University. You can follow him on Twitter at @jmascott. A version of this post originally appeared at K Street Cafe.
There are an almost overwhelming number of social media platforms for government officials or politicians to choose from for communicating with stakeholders about issues of public interest. These platforms are created fast and evolve even faster, making it hard for busy people to keep up with the latest "best practices." Here, I use two popular inside-the-Beltway publications to draw useful comparisons to two of the most popular social media platforms, Facebook and Twitter.
Facebook has broad reach like Politico
Although its coverage is focused exclusively on one topic, Politico maintains a broad and diverse audience. It is read by inside-the-Beltway professionals and political junkies everywhere, from DC to the South to the Midwest. In 2009, Politico reportedly had 6.7 million unique web visitors per month.
Like Politico, few people are unaware of Facebook, which for many has become a daily, must-read website with a trusted brand. When you go to Facebook, you know you will get a news feed of information from people within your social network. Facebook is a platform for vetting global information, and it rarely experiences downtime.
Facebook is used by a diverse representation of the American public. Co-workers, neighbors, and parents are increasingly likely to be Facebook users. According to Facebook, the site now has more than 500 million active users, 50 percent of which log in daily. The sheer volume of activity on the site makes it a no-brainer for government officials, politicians, advocacy professionals, and others looking to build a large and active following.
Facebook’s mainstream appeal also makes it an easier sell to management: because executives are also likely to know friends and family members who use the website regularly, it is easier for them to recognize the value of building a presence on the site.
Twitter is a niche channel like National Journal
Most people inside-the-Beltway probably know of the publication National Journal, and pay at least some peripheral attention to it. But few people outside this cloistered niche know what it is, or the influence that it carries. National Journal survives on niche influence, not on mass broadcasting - not unlike social media startup Twitter.
It's fair to say that Twitter is not mainstream. Although the site's usage continues to grow and was projected to reach 200 million users by the end of 2010, a very small percentage of the American public actively uses Twitter on a daily basis. One 2010 study estimated that just 21% of Twitter users are "active," with a relatively miniscule number of “power users” responsible for the vast majority of Tweets.
It is easy to see why these statistics might discourage advocacy professionals from dedicating scarce resources and budget to maintaining a Twitter account. Yet, despite the above metrics, Twitter should not be overlooked as a valuable communications channel.
The key is understanding Twitter’s primary advantage. Unless you are Ashton Kutcher, using Twitter is not about broadcasting to a large audience like Facebook or Politico. Rather, Twitter offers a way to engage with a small but influential user base, reflecting the approach taken by National Journal.
Like Politico, National Journal is narrowly focused on political issues. However, the publication’s readership is roughly half of Politico’s, with total circulation just under 12,000. Those 12,000 readers, however, are primarily made up of the most influential Beltway figures, including Members of Congress, Executive Branch officials, and their staffs.
Obviously, users of Twitter are not quite so uniformly prominent. In general, though, Twitter users do represent a more media-savvy, influential section of the population than, say people who watch the nightly network news.
In essence, Twitter is a place to influence the influencers. Govies, politicos, and advocacy professionals should not write off Twitter without understanding the unique, relatively unprecedented opportunities it offers to influence journalists, bloggers, policy wonks, and lawmakers. For organizations looking to engage meaningfully about policy issues online, Twitter is perhaps the place to start the conversation.
Influencing stakeholders: What's your strategy?
The editor of Publicyte, Mark Drapeau, recently published an article in Public Diplomacy Magazine called, "Corporate Public Diplomacy: Engaging and Improving Stakeholder Communities." In it, he discusses how big corporate brands can understand and meaningfully connect with communities.
Not unlike a President or a Senator or a Cabinet officer, a public-facing person at a large company like Microsoft can be tempted to use broadcast channels and general messages to "reach" the widest audience of people from Massachusetts, citizens interested in natural resources, or players of Xbox. In the context of this article, that's a "Facebook/Politico strategy" of sorts.
However, what Drapeau advocates in many cases is more like a Twitter/National Journal strategy, at least when it comes to new media and content creation. Publicyte itself is an example of the National Journal niche focus, aiming to talk about science, technology, and innovation as it affects the public and civic sectors. With a host of 1000-3000 word articles written for elites, it aims to write some of the more intelligent thought leadership in the field. The issues are of broad interest, but the conversation and content are aimed at a very narrow audience of influential people.
Thus, the above metaphor goes beyond just thinking about third-party media platforms - it applies to your entire engagement strategy. Whether you are forming a strategy around mainstream media and a long-form platform like Publicyte, using social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, or a hybrid approach like the Republicans' "America Speaking Out" site, to some degree, you need to decide if you're aiming for broad reach or a niche engagement. Sometimes, spending more quality time within a niche can have a larger payoff than blasting for maximum reach. And your choice of social media tools should reflect your overall goal.
Picture (thumbnail) of social media engagement used under Creative Commons.