Mitt Romney’s YouTube Faux Pau?
By corbenrice Posted in 2008 — Comments (5) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Mitt Romney took a bold step recently and became the first candidate to address the YouTube population directly. In his address to the YouTube society he asked the question, “What do you believe is America's single greatest challenge?”
This seems like a great idea on the surface. Free publicity, people become vested in your campaign and you show that you listen to the “people”. Win, Win, and Win right?
Then enters the responders. I have decided that at least some of them are joking in their response. (They have to be, no one is that dense) One or two even seem well thought out. On the whole though….. I’m speechless.
He has suggested that he would try to respond to some of them. So here is his quandary. How do you respond to uneducated responses without insulting the poster? There were some well thought out points made by responders but on the whole… wow.
Was this a false step by Romney? I don’t know. I look forward to seeing how he responds to “the people”.
Disclaimer: Still a Romney supporter,"bot".
Updated:fixed links
If I were in Romney's shoes, I would pick the cream of the crop quality wise (removing all jokers, gags, and sarcasts) and then from that subsection I would choose those videos that exhibit as complete a combination of the following as possible:
1. The speaker presents their statement in less than 30 seconds, using a vocabulary that isn't too "educated" (probably around the 9th grade reading level, a bit above the national average).
2. The speaker's tone and facial expression comes across as serious, concerned, and curious.
3. It should be obvious that the speaker isn't reading their statement from a card, notes, or any kind of script.
4a. The challenge they describe allows me to give a response which can highlight what will become one of my key messages to primary voters.
4b. The challenge and response are still compatible with (highlight or do not detract from) all my key messages come the general election - assuming I can already envision if/how any of the ideas I will emphasize will be different during the general versus the primary.
It doesn't matter if the ratio of responses that are "poor" to those that are well done is extremely high. If I'm Romney I only wanted 3-8 really good ones that I could use anyway. No one expects me to respond to all of them, and no sane person is going to watch all of the rest. Even contentious responses should be harmless - the greatest risk is that someone uses one for an attack ad against me but I think thats a very small risk versus the benefit of triggering some grassroots effort and helping to brand myself better among those Americans that tend to consume "new media" (a lot of youth vote there, among others).
If I use 3 videos, then I try to choose a 20 year old white male, a 30 year old black male, and a 30 year old white female. If I use 5 videos, I add another white male in his fourties and a 30-something black female. Add more up to maybe 8, as long as I have either the same number of females or only one less.
I release around one submitted video with my response per month on my website between now and the primaries, which tends to mean I'll want to choose around 8 if possible.
Basically, this is a low cost way for me to exploit another media conduit to get my message out - it doesn't take much time, although in the grand scheme of things it's also not going to be a huge impact - overall, it has a reasonable ROI and it's a fresh idea and that obviously counts for something, because look - I just got someone else to post a blog about it on RedState.
So, it's already paying off...
...and it's a fresh idea and that obviously counts for something, because look - I just got someone else to post a blog about it on RedState.
Ha! Too true.
I suppose that it is true that people don't expect him to respond to all posts, however I can see it backfiring on him too if he is too selective in his choices.
An interesting side note that I didn't discuss in length was the political leanings of many of his responses were to the left. What can we attribute that to? People on the left have more cameras? Visit YouTube more often? Are more prone to post themselves on the internet for possible ridicule?
If it is that the left visits YouTube more often will his appearance help Romney in the Primary?
A Constitution of Government once changed from Freedom, can never be restored. Liberty, once lost, is lost forever. -John Adams
If it is that the left visits YouTube more often will his appearance help Romney in the Primary?
Well, I guess conventional wisdom would say the majority of people using YouTube are young, and since conventional wisdom also says the majority of the young vote (D) then maybe his potential audience is smaller than he realizes. But it isn't non-existent, obviously not all youth vote (D) and if none of the other R candidates speak to them, they might listen to Romney, right? And one thing that might happen is that Romney's campaign gets a better sense for what actually is on the minds of this crowd as a whole, which in some cases might not actually differ between R/D in some cases, and that way he can maybe speak to those shared concerns more directly in the future (the general), and not just for this specific effort? Since the videos are public I guess anyone could mine them for ideas too... I don't know of course, I'm just guessing because trying to figure out the rationale for the idea seemed interesting...
I still see this is a very very low expense low cost effort, and only one of a large number of different efforts and methods any campaign might employ to get their message out and try to engage people. So the amount of time the campaign puts into it will be less than single percent all of its time, and the return will also be low impact - this wont make or break his campaign but each little piece might help. Maybe the best take away from this is that he's got a team who may be able to come up with many other interesting ideas and put together an entire "new media" package that really does help push him forward.
I'm
impressedshockedoverwhelmedoutragednot surprised.Somebody is probably paying for this
brain dead kidstupid little twitwhatever to go to college.Arggggh.
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Those who live by the sword get shot by those who don't.