Government elections are popularity contests and they always have been. Denying this fact is denying you had a favorite. The reason you vote is because you like one person more than the other, regardless of whether your reason is based on any valid merit. It’s a simple concept of social prowess. The best social avenue is the best way to get noticed. In this culture, that avenue is social media, a medium acknowledged by politicians.

Obama was one of the first (if not the first) elected official in the world that had obvious connections in social media. It undoubtedly played at least a small portion in his success in the polls. At the very least it provided him a way of analyzing his success during the election.

His success did not go unnoticed, even by our friends across the sea. In the UK, political parties are attempting to take hold of the social media culture, because through this community, the party has the most opportunity to succeed. Witnessing the correlation between popularity online and its conversion to votes, it is hard to deny the strength of a good online presence, even for government officials.