I’m returning to on-line canvassing. This is one of the most potent examples of using new technologies to influence behaviours in that most conventional of practices – casting a vote.
It has really got me thinking about how to effectively contact and engage with the masses but not with a ‘one size fits all’ mass media message. Here, surely, a very personalised message is needed.
Canvassing was traditionally about meeting people on the doorstep (and kissing babies and carrying shopping...). Astute candidates tailored the message to the feedback the householder gave them. Canvassing always took place in marginal seats where there were votes to be won – “getting the vote out”, the political parties called it. Little effort was expended by the other parties in safe seats.
So, how can the political parties make sure that the message they text you or place on You Tube will actually have resonance? It is in danger of being the e-equivalent of the leaflet which was chucked straight in the bin.
Even with the enriched data the party gathers through using web analytics (user logs tell you that so many hundred/thousand people have hit the area on tax reforms, for example) does not give a steer on what the receiver of the message has taken from the website. Providing a feedback section here is a must.
Is the visitor that sought after floating voter who has to be further persuaded with a follow-up text message? And is this then aimed at 30-50-year-olds who their market research tells them are most concerned about tax reforms, or is it opened out to a wider audience? And, anyway, is the mobile phone database full of supporters and the 'converted', so a message may be wasted on them anyway.
And, I wonder, if this asynchronous communication is the best way to establish if the receiver has really understood the message?
Barack Obama is the first president reckoned to have been elected by the power of an e-mail campaign. But here’s a note of caution to be heeded by politicians throwing all their efforts at the ‘new way’. It is already suspected that new communications technologies mean that receivers have so many sources of information that elites have less opportunities now to ‘control’ what people receive and digest.
The picture above is the Barony 'A' Frame - a monument to a traditional and largely disappeared industry - coalmining. I know the next election will be fought increasingly on-line but I think we'll still need traditional communications to fully engage with the electorate. The 'old ways' will not disappear totally, I suspect.
