Barack Obama Joins Social Network Google Plus
As 2011 comes to end, the Internet and social media role in politics is constantly increasing. Google had tried to attract politicians’ attention to Plus, but had no success. But it hasn’t repeated its mistakes and has achieved some progress over the last month.
Google’s published a guide to Google+ for politicians to help them on their way. With the addition of the president’s campaign this morning, I think it’s quite likely that today will be a tipping point for Google Plus adoption in the political space.
There are still plenty of talks about the number of people really using Google+ and whether it can ever overtake Facebook.
Over past months a great number of celebrities and important people have been joining Google+ including Aston Kutcher, Shahrukh Khan, Paris Hilton, Will.I.am and many others. One more famous user joined the site on Wednesday: the USA President Barack Obama.
Obama’s Google+ profile has already gotten a “verified account� tick mark (so it’s definitely President Obama’s Google+ official page) and has been launched on Wednesday morning. Actually, it is not run by the President himself, but by his reelection campaign and the profile’s posts makes no attempt to hide.
It’s not surprising that it took quite a long time for Obama to join the network, because Google has only recently released its Pages product, which allows brands and public features be present on the network without tying it to their own personal Google account.
Well, Obama’s presence on Google+ is an important sign of approval for the just created social network. In fact, Mr Obama is the most advanced President when it comes to technology.
Obama’s activity on Twitter and Facebook had stood him in good stead when he was a U.S. Senator running for the highest office in the land.
His social media presence is often said to have boosted his first presidential campaign, helping to recruit an army of young campaign workers and small donors. In June the President held a Town Hall with Twitter, and another one at Facebook in April.
Obama’s campaign page has 24 million followers on Facebook. As for Twitter, the campaign page got about 11 million followers. On Google Plus, the number is not counted yet. But about 4,500 people have given +1′d the page.
However, Obama’s registration may also indicate just how far Google+ has to go. His first post was one the most historic thing to happen on Google+ since its inception. It could be even bigger than the ‘Desmond Tutu and Dalai Lama Hangout’ that took place a few weeks ago.
More than 12 hours later it had boasted just 110 shares. (To compare, more popular stories on Facebook this week has been shared more than 3,000 times in a day.)
“Welcome to the Obama 2012 Google+ page,� was written in the first Presidential post. “We’re still kicking the tires and figuring this out, so let us know what you’d like to see here and your ideas for how we can use this space to help you stay connected to the campaign.�
Since the account was confirmed, Obama’s campaign has sent two moreposts Wednesday — the first one to speak the President’s tax credits for unemployed veterans, and the second one aimed to push a campaign contest where winners get to share dinner with Obama. It has also posted nine photos, and no videos
