Leading up to the last US Presidential election the world saw and experienced first hand the power of leveraging social media to share and broadcast a politicians message with the masses. When you compare the number of friends and followers that than Senator Barack Obama to that of Senator John McCain there was a clear distinction.
In Toronto, three individuals have already thrown their name into the hat and will be running to become the next Mayor of Toronto. Current Mayor David Miller has been quite active using his Twitter account to share occurrences in the city and other information which might be important ant to the citizens of Toronto @mayormiller.
So far we Former Ontario Conservative Leader John Tory and former Ontario cabinet minister George Smitherman have also thrown stated they are running, but a few days ago Rocco Rossi, Liberal party’s National Director resigned from his post and will be making his announcement that he also intends to run for Mayor of Toronto.
As the new candidates step into the arena, will they too turn to social media to help build their profile, create friends and followers and ultimately convert them to votes?
Mayoral Candidate’s Social Media / Online Profiles
It is still early in the game but here is what I’ve found so far for the 3 candidates and where they have a presence on the Internet.
Tory – John Tory on Twitter, John Tory on Wikipedia, John Tory on Facebook (Profile, Fan Page & another Fan Page), John Tory website (currently down)
Smitherman – George Smitherman on Twitter, George Smitherman on Wikipedia, George Smitherman on Facebook (Group), George Smitherman website
Rossi – Rocco Rossi on Twitter, Rocco Rossi on Wikipedia, Rocco Rossi on Facebook (Profile, Fan Page)
It will be interesting in the coming months to see what type of online strategy the candidates take with their public profile, as it stands right now Rocco Rossi is the only candidate to be open about his intentions on Twitter and also a profile that has the most followers (1,001) and you can actually engage with him.
Let the race begin….
