If a Twitter Handle Shouts, Does Anyone At the Capitol Hear It?
In politics, influence is everything. As everyone spends more time online, social media’s role (or lack of a role) in political influence is a common source of debate here at I&O.
At one point this summer we wondered how a measure of a political influencer’s social media influence might stack up against other influence rankings we’re accustomed to seeing, like “Best and Worst” lists.
To illustrate the concept, we decided to look at how Radian6 (a popular online media monitoring tool that uses algorithms and other factors to assess influence) ranked media publications, legislators and other influencers active on the Twitter hashtag #TxLege during the last two months of the regular session and during the special session. Once we had the Radian6 lists, we compared them to the other rankings.
This post neither is an endorsement nor criticism of Radian6; we chose Radian6 because it consistently appears in the top lists of social media monitoring tools organizations use. We omitted other influence indicators (e.g, Klout) because none of them focused specifically on influence on a Twitter hashtag. Radian6 influence score on a Twitter hashtag takes into account on-topic posts, followers, following, total updates and other factors.
Legislators
The easiest place to start was legislators, because we could lean on Texas Monthly’s “best and worst” lists for comparison. Here’s what we found. The top five Twitter-influential legislators were not among Texas Monthly’s 10 best. Nor were they the 10 worst, suggesting that Twitter had neither a direct nor inverse relationship with influence as measured by Texas Monthly. So, inconclusive. We are running some tests on other hypotheses; maybe there is a tie with geography/region; or age; or ethnicity. We will publish those if any holds true.
Top five legislators influential on Twitter #TxLege according to Radian6 influence score:
Rep. Joe Deshotel, D; @RepJoeDeshotel; Radian6 Influence Score: 73
Rep. Aaron Pena, R; @aaronpena; Radian6 Influence Score: 70
[also, @aaronfortexas. Scores here are for @aaronpena]
Rep. Jim Landtroop, R; @JimLandtroop; Radian6 Influence Score: 44
Rep. Kenneth Sheets, R; @kensheets107; Radian6 Influence Score: 42
Rep. Raul Torres, R; @RaulTorresRep; Radian6 Influence Score: 42
Media Outlets and Reporters
Comparing media outlet influence results were more challenging, as finding another list of influential media to compare the Radian6 Twitter-influential list to proved difficult. Still, it seems that Quorum Report, Texas Tribune and Dallas Morning News, Austin Bureau would show up on such a list were it compiled, and KUT News and Texas Politics Blog on Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News definitely make the grade as influential on the Texas Legislature.
Top five media outlets influential on Twitter #TxLege:
Quorum Report; @quorumreport; Radian6 Influence Score: 100
Texas Tribune; @texastribune; Radian6 Influence Score: 79
KUT News; @kutnews; Radian6 Influence Score: 52
Dallas Morning News – Austin Bureau; @AustinBureau; Radian6 Influence Score: 46
Texas Politics Blog on Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News; @TXPoliticsBlog; Radian6 Influence Score: 45
Media outlets were early adopters and use Twitter often. A 2011 study by Oriella PR Network found that journalists increasingly are relying on social media, particularly Twitter, for story leads and content.
When we looked at individual reporters, those in the top five surpass their own media outlets on Twitter as being influential on #TxLege. This might be a result of how the outlets approach use of the official media outlet handle and the use of individual reporter handles.
Top five reporters influential on Twitter #TxLege:
Nolan Hicks, Political Reporter for the San Antonio Express-News; @Ndhapple; Radian6 Influence Score: 77
Peggy Fikac, Austin Bureau Chief at San Antonio Express-News/Houston Chronicle; @pfikac; Radian6 Influence Score: 54
Alexa Garcia-Ditta, Intern at Texas Observer; @agarciaditta; Radian6 Influence Score: 52
Kate Alexander, Reporter at Austin American-Statesman; @katealexander; Radian6 Influence Score: 47
Scott Braddock, Political Analyst at KLRD, CBS11; @scottbraddock; Radian6 Influence Score: 46
Social media, whether it is here to stay as Twitter (or Facebook or YouTube or…) or not, cannot be ignored. Each of us hoping to make an impact – to affect a vote, an advocacy action or a purchase decision – must invest in the work of understanding how this fast moving channel affects our work.
Here is the list of top influencers on #TxLege who didn’t fall into one of the groups above. We’re always curious what folks are thinking, especially about influence. Let us know!
Top 10 other influencers on Twitter #TxLege:
Eliza Vielma, Americans for Prosperity Legislative Affairs and New Media; @MissLizaFace; Radian6 Influence Score: 73
Sibyl West, Independent Blogger and Supporter of Americans for Prosperity; @Ramparts360; Radian6 Influence Score: 69
Michael Quinn Sullivan, CEO of Empower Texans; @mqsullivan; Radian6 Influence Score: 64
Jasie Boyd, Policy Analyst at the Texas Legislative Study Group; @jasieboyd; Radian6 Influence Score: 60
Texas Impact; @tximpact; Radian6 Influence Score: 61
Michele Samuelson, Blogger for Empower Texans; @MjSamuelson; Radian6 Influence Score: 59
Bee Moorhead, Executive Director at Texas Impact; @BeeMoorhead; Radian6 Influence Score: 57
Sean Hennigan, Communications Director at Texas Impact; @thebackstageguy; Radian6 Influence Score: 56
Phillp Martin, Policy Director at Texas Legislative Study Group; @PhillipMartin; Radian6 Influence Score: 56
Empower Texans; @EmpowerTexans; Radian6 Influence Score: 55
-Elyse