Rand Paul dominates the Republican presidential pack on Facebook

[jct74]

Rand Paul dominates the Republican presidential pack on Facebook

Nick Morpus, Rare Contributor
Posted on June 19, 2015 3:55 pm

As cable news’ influence continues to shrink, especially among the young, the importance of social media in political campaigns continues to grow. According to Pew Research Center and NBC, Millennials overwhelmingly get their news from Facebook over that of traditional media.

“A Pew Research Center study found that 61 percent of Millennials (aged 18-33 currently) get political news from Facebook at least once a week, compared with 39 percent of Baby Boomers (aged 50-68).”

In fact, social media played a significant role in Obama’s 2008 and 2012 victories. Republicans couldn’t even keep up.

Right now, Senate Rand Paul (R-Ky.) is leading the Republican pack on Facebook in some important states. Bloomberg reports that Paul is “the most talked about Republican” in New Hampshire, Iowa, and South Carolina on social media “in terms of unique users.”

Earlier this month it was reported that Paul holds the most “likes” of any other presidential candidate on Facebook.

Rand Paul (R) — 2 million
Ben Carson (R) — 1.4 million
Ted Cruz (R) — 1.2 million
Rick Perry (R) — 1.1 million
Marco Rubio (R) — 875 thousand
Hillary Clinton (D) — 873 thousand
Bernie Sanders (D) 534 thousand
Rick Santorum (R) — 216 thousand
Lindsey Graham (R) — 112 thousand
Martin O’Malley (D) — 70 thousand
Carly Fiorina (R) — 60 thousand
George Pataki (R) — 15 thousand

...

read more:
http://rare.us/story/rand-paul-dominates-the-republican-presidential-pack-on-facebook/

 

[timosman]

Wait till they see the recent Snapchat ad /ducks

 

[cat_woman]

That's really impressive! Didn't realize he had way more FB followers than even Hillary.

 

[timosman]

That's really impressive! Didn't realize he had way more FB followers than even Hillary.

Wonder how many of those are paid for ?

 

[cat_woman]

Wonder how many of those are paid for ?

You mean Hillary's? They could be all genuine...... she's got less than a million. That's pathetic for someone with 100% name ID, and supposedly a "lock" on the dim nomination.

 

[timosman]

You mean Hillary's? They could be all genuine...... she's got less than a million. That's pathetic for someone with 100% name ID, and supposedly a "lock" on the dim nomination.

Hillary and genuine does not sound right - http://www.thecollegefix.com/post/13948/

 

[JohnCifelli1]

You can't pay for Facebook likes. You can pay to have your content visible to people in their newsfeeds, but the user still has to consume the content and decide to like the page it came from.

 

[acptulsa]

You can't pay for Facebook likes.

I can't?

I'll give you a thousand bucks for yours.

 

[CPUd]

You can't pay for Facebook likes. You can pay to have your content visible to people in their newsfeeds, but the user still has to consume the content and decide to like the page it came from.

LOL
http://www.autolikesgroup.com/
https://www.fiverr.com/gigs/likes/#page=1

 

[Ronin Truth]

Now when Facebook gets to pick the GOP POTUS nominee, we're all set.

 

[DevilsAdvocate]

You can't pay for Facebook likes. You can pay to have your content visible to people in their newsfeeds, but the user still has to consume the content and decide to like the page it came from.

You're wrong. There's an entire industry geared to selling Facebook likes. People create tons of fake profiles, usually of young attractive American girls, then sell their likes by the thousand. It's incredibly easy to do, anyone with an internet connection can pull it off.

http://theweek.com/articles/560046/inside-counterfeit-facebook-farm

 

[LawnWake]

I wouldn't get too excited about this. This is among the youth and youths don't vote. We counted too much on them last time around and just look where it got us. I get that there were issues relating to Iowa college students being back at home, unable to vote last time. But that wasn't the whole problem.

And who knows how many of these votes were bought by the campaign. Anyone have a good chart or graph that shows how much he's grown in likes since 2012?

 

[Mr.NoSmile]

That's really impressive! Didn't realize he had way more FB followers than even Hillary.

Her only recently having a Facebook campaign page could have something to do with it, as the page formerly known a 'Ready for Hillary' slowly gained more followers than any of the GOP candidates, Paul included.

 

[Rudeman]

Surprised Bernie Sanders isn't higher with how popular he seems to be online/with younger people.

 

[Mad Raven]

Rand already has more FB likes than Ron Paul ever did. Rand was at 900k a couple years ago.

 

[Jackie Moon]

I wouldn't get too excited about this. This is among the youth and youths don't vote. We counted too much on them last time around and just look where it got us. I get that there were issues relating to Iowa college students being back at home, unable to vote last time. But that wasn't the whole problem.

And who knows how many of these votes were bought by the campaign. Anyone have a good chart or graph that shows how much he's grown in likes since 2012?

I'm fully confident that Rand's Facebook likes are genuine.

We started tracking the Facebook stats of Ron, Rand and various potential 2016 candidates starting just after the 2012 election in this thread:

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showth...y-FB-likes-crash-as-Ron-Paul-s-steadily-rises


There's a summary on the first page that tracks Rand's growth over different dates, and throughout the thread I posted charts and graphs.

You can see that his numbers grew over time, with spikes around the drone filibuster and other events.

Also, a page with an inflated number of fake likes would lack activity on their posts... and Rand's have always done well. His original posting of his tax video from the 18th is nearing 2 million views, 40k shares and 30k likes.

For the age part, unfortunately Facebook doesn't publicly display as much info as they used to so we don't know what it is today... but in that thread I noted that the largest age bracket for people that liked Rand's page was 55+.

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showth...eadily-rises&p=4756435&viewfull=1#post4756435

 

[TaftFan]

Not exactly. What counts is not likes but interactions, and Rand does not always have the most interactions.

 

[acptulsa]

Also, a page with an inflated number of fake likes would lack activity on their posts... and Rand's have always done well. His original posting of his tax video from the 18th is nearing 2 million views, 40k shares and 30k likes.

Not exactly. What counts is not likes but interactions, and Rand does not always have the most interactions.

Hm. Jackie Moon posts figures. TF posts his usual doom and gloom, which is directly contradictory.

Gee. I wonder which one I believe.

 

[Voluntarist]

xxxxx

 

[65fastback2+2]

While a good sign, dont get too caught up in it.

I "like" Ted Cruz and Ben Carson, but wouldnt vote for either of them. I do it to keep up to date with what they're saying/writing.