October 19, 2006

Just two short months ago, when many Americans were on vacation sitting on the beach, almost 20 percent of U.S. adult Internet users (approx. 26 million people) went online for information or political news in a single day, according to the Pew Internet & American Life Project.

Such numbers are significant, considering that the November 2006 elections are only for select congressional districts and in mid-term contests.

During the last national election in November 2004, Pew says about 18 percent of the U.S. online adult population, or 21 million people, visited political information Web sites.

The candidates and their consultants have now all taken notice. For the 2008 national election, 92 percent of the 155 political consultants polled by the eVoter Institute, HCD Research and the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion, expect to spend between 1 and 50 percent of their campaign budgets online.

By the 2016 national elections, 18 percent of the respondents expect to spend more than half their campaign advertising budgets online.

Rich media ads on sites that belonged to parties other than the candidate (newspapers, TV networks, etc.) were most effective at garnering new email addresses (83 percent of respondents said so), getting people to take surveys (75 percent) and motivating the candidate's base and raising money (70 percent each).

However, it is the "linked-as-friends" and user-generated ads now appearing on MySpace, Facebook, YouTube and Friendster that are the most interesting, or em-
barrassing (!) to watch. Since September, Friendster has sponsored a contest for users to post their own political ads and will award cash prizes to the winners after Nov. 6.

Facebook created 1,400 candidate profiles that list names, states, parties and offices, according to USA Today. Of those, about 300 are updated by candidates or their staff.

Additionally, in mid-October, AOL introduced its own political blog, called The Stump.

Source: eMarketer