Wednesday 21st January 2009 marked a significant day in the history of the United States. It was the day Barack Obama became the first ever black US President as he was inaugurated in front of thousands of onlookers at Washington DC’s National Mall.

Whilst his election came as no surprise to many of us what was particularly interesting of his campaign was how he embraced the Internet and specifically Web 2.0.

Hope and Change
Unlike John McCain, Obama’s campaign made full use of the Internet to build his brand, deliver his message and build relationships with his voters and the wider world. With his team of experienced, innovative and progressive marketers he launched and executed what was to be a highly successful Internet marketing campaign.

Obama used a message of “Hope and Change” as the core of his campaign. This message was distributed across his entire Internet presence and formed the cornerstone of his web strategy. Furthermore, not only did Obama have a message of hope and change, but he positioned himself as the one to provide hope and deliver change. He branded himself as the agent for change and his message supported his brand.

Obama 2.0
Obama fully embraced the Internet and the power of Web 2.0. A large part of his Internet strategy focused on using social networks to communicate, engage and build relationships with people.

Obama had a presence on all of the top social networking sites including Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, LinkedIn, Digg, Eventful, and YouTube. He also participated on some niche social networking sites like BlackPlanet, Faithbase, MiGente, AsianAve, and MyBatanga. Not only that, but Obama also created his own social networking site to converse with and empower supporters.

The key to Obama’s online success was that he didn’t just have a presence on these social networking sites, but he actively participated in these online communities. He accepted friends, befriended others, added favorites, uploaded videos, and posted messages.

The Obama campaign also posted ads on Facebook, uploaded PDFs to Scribd, and shared photos on Flickr. They embraced all that Web 2.0 could offer their campaign.

The 44th President
New technology is shrinking the world we live in and Obama’s success can show us just how much of a difference utilising these technologies can make. Whilst his election can be attributed to many factors, Obama’s US Presidential Campaign leveraged the Internet, Web 2.0, and social networks to deliver his message, expose his brand, and drive traffic to his offers.

Entrepreneurs and Internet Marketers alike could learn a lot from his strategy.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, January 1st, 2009 at 10:08 am and is filed under Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.