Winning elections with the internet: Google Surge back in the news

Last month I blogged about what’s called a “Google Surge“:

The phrase “Google Surge” (aka a “network blast” for those less keen on using a militaristic vocabulary for all things political) has been coined to describe the practice of blanketing websites viewed by inhabitants of a particular area with geo-targeted online adverts in the last few days of an election campaign…

With a general election in the UK due by June 2010 – and most likely taking place in May – will this tactic be the next American import to British politics?

For my answer to that question read my original post, but since then there’s been another American election in which the Google Surge featured. Scott Brown’s victory in the Massachusetts Senate by-election caused by the death of Ted Kennedy featured a Google Surge, with around $145,000 being spent on it in the last few days of the campaign.

Scaled down to the size of a UK Parliamentary constituency, that is equivalent to around £1,300: not a cheap tactic and not one that suits UK Parliamentary expense limits of typically around £10,000 to cover four weeks. However, it does show the scope for using such tactics as part of national campaigns, even with UK level of election spending.

Brown didn’t just spend money online, he also raised it online. Most notably, Twitter played a useful role in his online fundraising – though note from the following account that he first built a list by firing up peoplewith a strong campaign message and only then had the necessary size of audience to raise money online:

On December 28, Brown announced what became the signature force behind his campaign, his pledge to be a 41st vote against President Obama’s national health care reform legislation. Accompanying that news on his Twitter feed was this notation: #41stvote. Referred to as a hashtag, those nine characters became a mechanism to attract like-minded activists and identify new ones. Reflecting an enthusiasm gap not just in the state but among national politicos, Brown now boasts more than 11,000 Twitter followers, compared to barely 4,000 for Democrat Martha Coakley.

That following paid dividends last Monday when, aided by a strong Twitter campaign from Brown and dozens of his newest online advocates, the Republican smashed a fundraising goal of $500,000 for a one-day “money bomb,” generating instead well beyond $1 million. That total from just 24 hours was well beyond what he had raised in the entire previous fundraising period.

As with Obama, a key part of Brown’s successful online fund raising was the combination of messages and motivation which first built a large online audience.