What was your favorite moment of 2012? So much happens each year that we often forget to take time to reflect in the moment.
As we embark upon 2013, Jeremiah Warren has pulled together a short video on YouTube looking back on some of the past year’s highlights including events in the Middle East, London Olympics, 2012 presidential election, NASA, Disney’s purchase of Lucasfilms, the Pope’s first tweet, Kate Middleton’s pregnancy, the Mayans and several memorial tweets remembering those we lost.
This year, we will all witness and likely participate in the 2012 U.S. presidential election in an unprecedented manner thanks to social media and rapidly emerging technology. Not only are the campaigns and mainstream media using these tools, but voters will also have unique opportunities that will help inform their vote on Election Day come November. Here are five ways that digital media is changing the modern political environment in the U.S.:
Almost anyone who has been near a radio this summer has certainly heard Carly Rae Jepsen’s catchy tune, “Call Me Maybe.” In June, our family embarked upon a massive roadtrip that took us from Washington, DC to Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Missouri, West Virginia and back. We must’ve heard this song at least two dozen times while in the car, usually with a “Turn it up!” request from my girls in the backseat.
As it turns out, we weren’t the only ones. The Harvard University baseball team had a little fun with the song, as well. Apparently, on a roadtrip of their own back in May 2012, they sang and danced to the tune from the backseat of their van and uploaded a video of it to YouTube. Then, the Internet took notice. At the time of this post, their video had over 14.6 million views. But it didn’t end there.
The Edelman Global Public Affairs team has released findings from the 2011 Capital Staffers Index, an annual global study that analyzes top trends in global public affairs and communications.
This year’s expanded report is the third annual survey based on interviews with over 500 senior staffers (legislative directors and above) from capital cities in 11 different countries around the world including Washington DC, Brussels, London, Beijing, Ottawa, Mexico City, Paris, Berlin, New Delhi, Buenos Aires and Brasilia.
Although traditional methods public affairs components are still valuable, social media channels have experienced a meteoric rise in their ability to shape and influence policy worldwide over the past year.
As the 2012 presidential campaign continues to heat up, Election Day 2011 is just around the corner. In less than twelve days, Americans will head to the polls on Tuesday, November 8th to cast votes for various state and local candidates. And, we’ll be almost exactly one year away from voting to determine whether President Obama will serve a second term.
This morning, I had the pleasure of speaking at the Holmes Report’s ThinkTank Live event here in Washington, DC where I discussed the evolving media landscape and the role of social media in shaping politics and public policy. In preparation, I got to thinking about how social media was impacting the election process this early in the race. Between the Romney-Perry video battles and the buzz around Herman Cain’s “smoking” ad featuring his chief of staff Mark Block, it was a perfect week to perform a little deeper analysis.
We discussed the new Kindle, Apple price fixing allegations, President Obama’s “We the People” petition via WhiteHouse.gov, government and social media, crowdsourcing, ID spoofing and much more.
Well, January 2011 is now behind us — and what a month it has been. Between the tragic shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona and complete Middle East meltdowns in Tunisia, Egypt and Jordan, one can only hope that things will get better! I remember so many people anxious to turn the calendar after last year but thought I’d take one last look back before officially saying goodbye.
In January 2010, I compiled a list of the Top 2009 news stories that either began on the Internet or gained additional steam online due to the impact of social media. After receiving a lot of terrific feedback, I decided to do it again. However, this time I tracked the stories in real time as the year progressed as opposed to trying to remember the sequence of events at the end of the year.
Since I live and work in Washington, DC, I tried to keep a special eye out for stories related to politics and/or government. Now that most of the stats are in and stories have unfolded — one month into 2011 — let’s take a journey back. Without further ado, here are my Top 20 Social Media News Stories of 2010 (in chronological order).
Today, Edelman released the findings of our 2010 Capital Staffer Index during an event hosted in the Washington, DC office. Edelman’s Public Affairs & StrategyOne teams interviewed senior legislative staffers around the globe in several capital cities including Berlin, Brussels, London, Paris and Washington to determine the role and influence of various communications channels both online and off. Below are some of my initial — and personal — thoughts about the U.S. survey results.
Generating new sales leads can be challenging, time consuming and frustrating — but it’s a critical element in growing a business. Believe me, I’ve been there and can sympathize with anyone who has ever had to build a list from scratch, make a cold call or contact someone they simply don’t know.
Some people really thrive on the excitement of aggressively securing a new lead, while others are uncomfortable with the pursuit. In either case, there’s no excuse — especially with all the information available on the Internet these days — for not performing even the most basic research before reaching out to a prospect.
A couple weeks ago, I received an unsolicited sales email. Personally, I prefer to receive a phone call first, but if an email does arrive in my Inbox, I would hope that the sender would at least make sure that it’s relevant to the recipient.
This year, we will all witness and likely participate in the 2012 U.S. presidential election in an unprecedented manner thanks to social media and rapidly emerging technology. Not only are the campaigns and mainstream media using these tools, but voters will also have unique opportunities that will help inform their vote on Election Day come November. Here are five ways that digital media is changing the modern political environment in the U.S.:
This year’s expanded report is the third annual survey based on interviews with over 500 senior staffers (legislative directors and above) from capital cities in 11 different countries around the world including Washington DC, Brussels, London, Beijing, Ottawa, Mexico City, Paris, Berlin, New Delhi, Buenos Aires and Brasilia. 
Some people really thrive on the excitement of aggressively securing a new lead, while others are uncomfortable with the pursuit. In either case, there’s no excuse — especially with all the information available on the Internet these days — for not performing even the most basic research before reaching out to a prospect.
