These days politicians, of course Western politicians, are doing online micro-election campaigning. They pick all the activities you have on your profile – the posts, the likes , etc- and based on that will develop a customized ad that will appeal to your emotion. The end goal is to make you LIKE them and possibly connect with their campaigns.
They begin by understanding what you like best and systematically they peel the wall and connect with you. When you post on you dislike on tax, you will be sure to get a “customized” ad that will tell you how the politician shares your frustration with high taxes.
Facebook Washington DC office focuses on providing tools to politicians to help them connect with people in their networks. With the plugin, politicians can target people efficiently like has never happened. This is a new domain for social media consulting because most times people do not turn off these politicians because they come through a point they know you want. You like higher taxes, they pretend they offer a solution in that. You hate green house emission, they link to their statements supporting your view. It is about mining your data and using that to construct an ad that will appeal to you.
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Online micro-electioneering is going to become a growth area in coming months as the U.S. 2012 election heats up. So the politicians can make thousands of ads which are constantly tuned to particular and specific Facebook users. Facebook provides them data that makes the ads intuitive and relevant. Ads in Facebook is relatively cheaper, about 40c per click, and they can launch many at a time and quickly know the particular ad that people are responding to best. The idea is to figure out the one that drives higher response.
In platforms like FarmVille, politicians are also promoting themselves which enable people to visit friend’s farms to campaign. Expect to see more in Zynga and other popular platforms in Facebook and possibly MySpace. Notice that it is not just the Like they want, they also like your purse and if you connect, be ready to open your wallet for the politicians.