K Street Cafe

Ten Commandments of Campaign Social Media (e.politics)
Ten rules of campaign social media you should live by.

Choose the Right Marketing Channels to Reach the Right Members (Forum)
Association marketing, like television, provides tons of choices, however, you’ve got to find the right channels.

Nine Things Campaigns Shouldn’t Forget in the Gee-Whiz World of the Social Web (e.politics)
A great list of things all campaigns should not lose sight of when employing social media.

Vote iQ Takes Swipe at Facebook as a Political Platform
(Hillicon Valley)
The political social network Vote iQ took a shot at Facebook recently, arguing the social networking site is not suited for hosting political discussions.

Google Tries its Hand at Influence in Washington
(The Wall Street Journal)
The company’s growing influence is Washington, especially in the realm of ‘virtual lobbying,’ is drawing concern from critics of the popular search engine.

In Online Political Ads, Facebook Is Catching Up to Google (techPresident)
Political consultants say Facebook’s share of online political advertising dollars is quickly growing to rival Google’s.

By Erica L. Fitzsimmons

A few more thoughts on the new Facebook changes, privacy concerns and what Four Square and Gowalla should be concerned about.

The recent Facebook platform changes may have advantages for advocacy professionals as I discussed in my earlier post, “Facebook Takeover,” but due to widespread privacy concerns, several Facebook members are thinking about quitting the wildly popular social networking site.  And by several, I mean approximately 60% of them — according to a survey conducted by IT security firm, Sophos.
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How Much Should Candidates Court The Web?
(National Journal)
Recently, Newt Gingrich advised his party’s candidates to spend big on new media campaigns, suggesting they have as big a budget for new media as they do for radio and television.

Pennsylvania AG Drops Subpoena Against Twitter (techPresident)
Tom Corbett, Pennsylvania Attorney General, dropped a grand jury subpoena of Twitter seeking the identities of users who tweeted negatively about him.

The state of Maryland, the attorney general of Pennsylvania and a group of researchers are taking on political campaigns using social media platforms.

Maryland’s State Board of Elections is submitting a proposal on June 3 requiring candidates to include standard language on their Facebook pages and their associations with these campaigns. In addition, the proposal would require candidates to create a system of authenticated official Twitter accounts. If this proposal passes, regulation could begin as early as this year.
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Interest Groups Log On for Fight Over Kagan
(Roll Call – subscription required)
With the high court confirmation hearings of Elena Kagan looming, grassroots lobbying has gone virtual, relying on social media such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.

When Twitter Meets Politics (The Press Democrat)
Though most believe social networking sites are imperative for campaigns, some campaign consultants and candidates believe it’s not always for the better.

House Dems Debut New Media Group (Hillicon Valley)
Earlier this week House Democrats launched a campaign to help members better utilize social networks before the 2010 midterm elections.

Facebook, MySpace Confront Privacy Loophole
(The Wall Street Journal)
Have these social networking sites been breaching their own privacy policies as well as industry standards?

Cross-posted from Epolitics.com

Here’s a quick point that never hurts to repeat: asking people to send a message to Congress through an online advocacy system mean that you have to DELIVER the emails via the internet. In fact, it’s usually more effective to print them out and hand-deliver them, particularly as part of a visit from a lobbyist or citizen activist. This idea isn’t new — it shows up in the Online Politics 101, for example — but it’s easy to forget in an era when the default setting for online advocacy too often is to fall back on email alone when communicating with decision-makers. But as both hard experience and Congressional Management Foundation research have shown, a Congress that’s flooded with hundreds of millions of messages a year may well fail to notice when they get a few more.

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Politicians Love the iPad — and There’s Nothing Wrong With That (Gigaom)
Lately, it seems many on Capitol Hill have developed a fondness for Apple’s iPad.

ClickZ’s Digital Political Campaigns 101 (ClickZ)
This free downloadable resource provides practical online campaigning tips. The first chapter is written by K Street Café contributor, Colin Delany.