Sarah Palin's Powerful Online Footprint

In his Friday column in Florida's Sayfie Review, Jordan Raynor opines that having the largest online "footprint" possible is not just an option for candidates. He says that it "is absolutely critical to political survival."

Raynor says a massive online presence is the best way to fight back against attacks from both the legacy media and "anonymous bloggers" to get your side of the story out. And he cites the example of former Senator George Allen of Virgina and his "macaca" moment for those skeptics who don’t think a situation will arise when they will need to communicate their side of a story in response to bad press:

In 2006, George Allen was the assumed front runner in the race for the Republican nomination for President. It only took a one minute YouTube video of Allen slipping a racial slur to not only end his presidential aspirations but also bring him to defeat in his re-election bid for the U.S. Senate. Unlucky for Allen, the now famous "macaca" video was the first of its kind - a video recorded on someone’s personal video camera, uploaded to YouTube and then spread virally through the internet.

The devastating element of the "macaca" video was not the racial slur itself, but rather the Allen campaign’s inability to defend themselves on the field they were being attacked on.

That last point is important. Raynor says that political candidates defend themselves using the same medium through which they are attacked:

When candidates are attacked on television, they defend themselves on television. When candidates are attacked through direct mail, they defend themselves through direct mail. When candidates are attacked online --- few defend themselves online because they have not made the long term investment of building their online footprint, leaving them with no weapons to fight back.

According to Raynor, Allen is the worst-case example of how to handle political communications in the online space. Which public figure represents the best case? That would be none other than Sarah Palin:

Sarah Palin currently boasts twice the amount of Facebook fans as Ron Paul, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, Bobby Jindal, Tim Pawlenty, Haley Barbour, Charlie Crist and Jeb Bush combined. More importantly than posting incredible numbers in the online space (she also boasts 142,000+ Twitter followers) Palin is actually leveraging her massive online footprint to communicate exactly the message she wants her supporters to hear - with no media filter.

Immediately following the announcement of her resignation, mainstream news organizations scrambled to find the first hints of reason behind Palin's decision. Before they could get to the source or anyone close to the Governor, Palin communicated directly to her most loyal supporters - via Facebook. Not an interview on the network nightly news, not a radio segment with Rush Limbaugh, but a Facebook note.

Sarah Palin not only successfully countered attacks using Facebook, but she managed to make the U.S. Senate drop a controversial provision from proposed legislation. That is not just an online footprint; it's political power.

- JP