Twitter political index

According to Twitter official blog, they launched a new barometer for the election.

The Twitter Political Index is a daily measurement of  Twitter users’ feelings towards the candidates as expressed in nearly two million Tweets each week.

The Twitter Political Index is built in partnership with the data analysis team at Topsy(@Topsy) and two respected polling firms: The Mellman Group (@markmellman) andNorth Star Opinion Research (@northstaropin).Each day, the Index evaluates and weighs the sentiment of Tweets mentioning Obama or Romney relative to the more than 400 million Tweets sent on all other topics. For example, a score of 73 for a candidate indicates that Tweets containing their name or account name are on average more positive than 73 percent of all Tweets.Just as new technologies like radar and satellite joined the thermometer and barometer to give forecasters a more complete picture of the weather, so too can the Index join traditional methods like surveys and focus groups to tell a fuller story of political forecasts. It lends new insight into the feelings of the electorate, but is not intended to replace traditional polling — rather, it reinforces it.For example, the trend in Twitter Political Index scores for President Obama over the last two years often parallel his approval ratings from Gallup, frequently even hinting at where the poll numbers are headed. But what’s more interesting are the periods when these data sets do not align, like when his daily scores following the raid that killed Osama bin Laden dropped off more quickly than his poll numbers, as the Twitter conversation returned to being more focused on economic issues.

By illustrating instances when unprompted, natural conversation deviates from responses to specific survey questions, the Twitter Political Index helps capture the nuances of public opinion.

The Index for each candidate updates every day after 8 p.m. ET to reflect shifts in conversation from that day’s events, and is available along with a historical chart atelection.twitter.com. During the runup to the election, our partners will be featuring this data on their sites as well: Topsy will be posting detailed analysis atwww.topsylabs.com/election, and USA Today is using the Index to create the USA Today/Twitter election meter throughout the campaign. We’ll also tweet daily updates and other observations at @gov.

Posted by Adam Sharp, Head of Government, News and Social Innovation – @AdamS

Google Plus helps politicians

I really love Google and his ambitious projects. Today, I found out that he even help politicians to communicate with their voters. Please take a look below:

Elect to connect

Share more with your voters and constituents through a Google+ Page

By creating a Google+ Page for your public office or campaign, you and your staff can promote an issue, platform or cause across the web. You can put a +1 button anywhere on the web that you’d like for people to support your content, and you can connect your Google+ Page to your website and Google search results, via Google Direct Connect. Regularly posting interesting content, engaging with your followers by asking questions, and sharing photos and videos are all ways to keep people coming back for more.

Check it out: See how Senator Bernie Sanders polls his constituents for ideas or how the French governing party, UMP, and main opposition party,Parti Socialiste, share their campaign platforms on their Google+ Pages.

Show what you support, and who supports you with +1

To help define your political positions, you can now publicly support political ideas, projects or news articles by clicking the +1 button on other Google+ Pages, posts or articles across the web. And people who share your viewpoint can express themselves by clicking the +1 button on your Google+ Page or on your posts. You can also set up the +1 button on your office website or on your campaign display ads to connect it to your Page.

Check it out: Constituents expressed their viewpoints on British Prime Minister David Cameron’s post about the G20 summit through +1s and comments.

Tailor messages to different audiences with Circles

Google+ allows you to group followers into Circles, so you can tailor messages to different groups of voters or constituents. For instance, you can create a specific circle for those who shared or +1-ed your posts, or for your donors. If you want your message to reach everyone, simply click on Public.

Check it out: See how Michigan Governor Rick Snyder reached out to his Google+ followers to add more people to his circles.

Hang out with your voters or constituents anywhere in the world, right from your office

Host a virtual Town Hall meeting, keep office hours, or meet face-to-face with constituents across the country through Hangouts, an easy-to-use high-quality group video chat for up to 10 people. In the future, you can also live stream your Hangout on YouTube for other interested parties to follow – a handy tool for communicating with voters.

Check it out: Broadcast live by Fox News’ Special Report with Bret Baier, Governor Mitt Romney spoke with voters through Hangouts. His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu used Hangouts to connect for the inaugural Desmond Tutu Peace lecture.

Share photos of your campaign and meetings

Google+ lets you easily upload, edit and share photos of your campaign wherever you are. With Instant Upload, photos you take with an Android device can be stored automatically online, so you can access them on Google+ in one click. If you allow geo-tagging to locate your pictures, constituents can also virtually follow you on the road.

Check it out: See how French leading democrat Deputy François Bayrou shared photos from his daily meetings with constituents, or how Senator Mark Warner shared a YouTube video of his trip across Virginia to meet with local communities.

Dear Google, you rock!

Better tomorrow,

PR Pret-a-Porter.