Rudd urged to exploit social media by Obama's digital strategist
Australian Prime Minster Kevin Rudd has been advised to embrace social media and data monitoring ahead of the federal election by the political data scientist who advised US President Barack Obama.
Rayid Ghani
Rayid Ghani is addressing the ADMA Forum in Sydney next week. This week The Drum reported that Rudd had enlisted President Obama’s digital strategy team to assist him in the election.
Ghani says data sources from all campaign activities need to be harvested and exploited.
“We worked with every department in the campaign and helped them to be more efficient and more effective,” he said.
“We spent a lot of effort on getting people to vote. We used [data] to identify what makes a voter a swing voter.
“We found out what kinds of people can be persuaded. We started with the ones most likely and started calling them.
“It was very critical for us in the Obama campaign in reaching younger people. They don't watch TV. They don't have landlines. They're not at home opening doors in the daytime. We could find them on social media and really get their friends to persuade them.”