Obama is the new Apple
Adrian McDermott
June 4th, 2008
Obama has made almost perfect use of Web 2.0 to build his campaign - and generate income at a speed that has amazed most observers, and shocked all his rivals. I think people writing about PR on the web may use his campaign to show exactly when Web 2.0 came of age, and for many years quote it as a textbook example of building community support by
- Offering unique appeal to core supporters
- Encouraging them to build communities
- Using - or enabling others to use - every possible medium to spread the message
The Amazing Money Machine by Joshua Green in The Atlantic gives a detailed analysis of just how effectively all this has been done. Green ‘opted to undergo the full tech immersion while reporting this piece, and soon had Obama ring tones on my phone, new networks of online “friends,” text-message updates from the campaign, and regular e-mails
from its manager, all gently encouraging me to give money, volunteer time, bring in new friends, and generally reorient my life in ways that were made to seem hip and fun’.
For me, there are two key points. First, Obama understood the influence of the web at the right time - and knew where to find the people who can wield it, and how to appeal to them. He is proposing the kind of legislation to appeal to Silicon Valley, and has made himself available. The result has been powerful affinity groups like entrepreneursforobama.com and social networking and campaign focus sites such as my.barackobama.com doing all the hard work, and doing it much more effectively than a central organization.
The second point is that he does not seem to be acting a part. Being new, young, and intelligent appeals to web users and entrepreneurs, be he also seems to be sympathetic to the ideals of the web - openness and resistance to manipulation. That has also meant letting the thing roll rather than trying to control it too much, which would probably have killed it.
Like Apple, Obama ‘got it’ at just the right time. Like Apple, Obama has had a lot of negative press on the web, but had built a strong enough core following and ‘cool factor’ to achieve critical mass by then. I am sure people will try to paint Hillary as akin to Microsoft, (predictably, but very amusingly, including Fake Steve Jobs), and perhaps with some justification as someone who got it a bit too late - and not quite as well.