First Social Media Election Tweets in Ontario

By Kenna McHugh 

With just a few days until Ontario’s Election Day, the online hunt for votes is moving daily at a faster rate.

The election is being called the province’s first real social media election. The candidates are using social media sites such a Twitter and Facebook to attract and communicate with voters as a part of just about every politician’s campaign.

In this election, particularly, we are seeing social media play a role as a must-have, not something to do for fun, like kissing babies. The candidates mean business. If you want to win the election, you have to be involved with social media.

Posting and commenting on Twitter and Facebook is the door-to-door that candidates used to do because with social media they are reaching a massive audience. It is an audience that is engaged in the campaign and is likely to turn out and vote.

An interesting note made by CBS News Canada, while the online discussion about Ontario’s election has been lively, social media advocates have noticed a decline in chatter from the student vote. Usually, messages tagged with #studentvote are common, but now, that chatter is practically nonexistent during the current provincial campaign.

CBS News also reports that the students are still involved, but have gone back to the basics of campaigning with t-shirts bearing the phrase “I only date boys (or girls) who vote.” The reason behind the t-shirt campaign is that young voters can relate to a catchy phrase like that; especially, if they want to date in college.