RETWEET!!! We need better #P2 message coordination on Twitter

One of things the Netroots needs to do better is to retweet each other and progressive elected officials in greater, coordinated mass. We need to take a lesson from the right, because they have this nailed.

Take a look at the RT machines that spring into action whenever Eric Cantor tweets via @GOPLeader or @MichelleMalkin tweets. The right on Twitter swing into action to retweet fast and furiously.

We need to beat them at this game.

A few things need to happen to make this work.

1. Unifying hashtag… we already have #p2 out there… keep an eye on it and retweet when you see something good from our side. Set up a column in your Tweetdeck/Hootsuite/Sessmic app for #p2, or just bookmark a search page on Twitter for #p2.

2. Monitor progressive members of Congress and retweet them. Twitter lists already exist here: House Dems, Senate Dems, and House Progressive Caucus. When they tweet something worth retweeting, do it. Add the #p2 hashtag if it isn’t already there.

3. Monitor the right and counter their hashtag and tweet campaigns with counter messaging. Be sure to use their hashtag in order to deny them dominance over it (I call this Denial of Hashtag, or DOH!). If they say, “Government doesn’t belong between a person and their doctor,” ask them if that includes between a woman and her doctor discussing reproductive health issues. Use these ready made lists to follow: House GOP members are here and Senate GOP members are here.

Some examples of things in the recent past explain the importance of this effort:

Leading up to the anniversary of the Stimulus (ARRA), @GOPleader launched a campaign to bad mouth the stimulus using the #stimulus hashtag. We should’ve been all over that with counter messaging. Many progressive activists were, but our elected officials were absent, as were the majority of us. We need to rally the troops.

During the vote for the Ryan Budget, the House Progressive Caucus was promoting their amendment with the #budget4all hashtag. We should’ve pushed that from Natchez to Mobile, from Memphis to St. Joe… and across the country.

If you’ve got a blog, let your readers know to participate if they are also on Twitter.If you are on Facebook or Twitter… start your engines and push out our messaging. But don’t just reinvent the wheel by saying it yourself… RETWEET!!! Build up massive numbers of retweets for our best tweets. The impact will not go unnoticed.

We need to create and sustain a coordinated WALL OF PROGRESSIVE MESSAGING on Twitter… and elsewhere. Unless we are coordinated, we cannot expect to counter coordinated messaging efforts from the right.

If you want cues, follow me at @drdigipol (personal) and @CAPaction (work). I am trying to feed this beast. Help me.

Now, hop to it, my friends. :)

Billy Graham’s daughter (@AFministeries) says we need religion so we can understand fear on @MeetthePress today. But is religion the only way we learn to feel and understand fear? Not for most of us, and probably not for any of us.

Perhaps the most privileged among us are so protected from fear that they need religion to teach them of it. And those of us who are less fortunate might find religion helps us understand and cope with fear. But there are certainly other sources of inspiration and understanding to learn of fear. So is religion necessary to no fear, after all?

“Not a sermon, just a thought,” as the rabbi says on the radio…. Was he a rabbi? Or am I just projecting?

Either way, some grist.

To view the full image above, click here. Zack Exley famously said, “If a consultant walks into your office and says they can make your campaign go viral, throw them out because they don’t know what they’re talking about.” His point is that virality is a phenomenon, not a strategy. You can replicate all the qualities of a piece of content that has gone viral and still not have it go viral. What you can do is create a good piece of content with all the sharing tools built in, promote it via word of mouth efforts to key influencers with influential and/or large audiences and create the right set of circumstances that when your efforts hit a nerve, the content can go viral. Now, just because your content doesn’t go viral, doesn’t mean it is a failure. A good word of mouth campaign can generate hundreds of thousands of views and shares of your content. But that outcome is the direct result of your outreach efforts. Virality is when the spread of your content takes on a life of its own (hence the metaphorical reference to a virus). In a petri dish, a culture grows exponentially under its own power. That is the subtle line that differentiates good word of mouth campaigns from viral explosions. So it is always ok to hope your stuff goes viral, but never plan on it. Always plan on a concerted effort to promote your content far and wide to your networks. As for the image above, it actually speaks more to a good word of mouth campaign that could go viral than to a viral campaign. So the lessons in it are good ones. Given all this, I think it is fair to say that “Viral Marketing” is like vaporware… it sounds good, but there is no there, there. Plan well, work hard, and get your content out there for the world to share. Just don’t call it viral marketing, cause it ain’t.
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To view the full image above, click here.

Zack Exley famously said, “If a consultant walks into your office and says they can make your campaign go viral, throw them out because they don’t know what they’re talking about.”

His point is that virality is a phenomenon, not a strategy. You can replicate all the qualities of a piece of content that has gone viral and still not have it go viral.

What you can do is create a good piece of content with all the sharing tools built in, promote it via word of mouth efforts to key influencers with influential and/or large audiences and create the right set of circumstances that when your efforts hit a nerve, the content can go viral.

Now, just because your content doesn’t go viral, doesn’t mean it is a failure. A good word of mouth campaign can generate hundreds of thousands of views and shares of your content. But that outcome is the direct result of your outreach efforts.

Virality is when the spread of your content takes on a life of its own (hence the metaphorical reference to a virus). In a petri dish, a culture grows exponentially under its own power. That is the subtle line that differentiates good word of mouth campaigns from viral explosions.

So it is always ok to hope your stuff goes viral, but never plan on it. Always plan on a concerted effort to promote your content far and wide to your networks.

As for the image above, it actually speaks more to a good word of mouth campaign that could go viral than to a viral campaign. So the lessons in it are good ones.

Given all this, I think it is fair to say that “Viral Marketing” is like vaporware… it sounds good, but there is no there, there. Plan well, work hard, and get your content out there for the world to share. Just don’t call it viral marketing, cause it ain’t.