The race for the next President of the United States rumbles on. A lot of attention is being placed on how Data Analytics is playing a role in the campaigns. Social media scraping and audience analytics. An Artificial Intelligence Twitter account that tweets like Donald Trump. Political elections and the data that surrounds them are now inextricably linked.
Could the use of Data Analytics be the key to gaining a majority and the keys to the Oval Office?
Here are several uses of Data Analytics to sway the undecided voters. Also a look at how politicians in the future might use the technology to their advantage.
During the 2012 re-election campaign for Barack Obama, Data Science was first used. This was the first time during a large-scale political campaign. Using a platform called Narwhal, Obama’s team were able to monitor every aspect of his campaign. More importantly, what was being said online about what Obama said in front of the cameras.
In near real-time, they could see how his speeches had been being received. Whether a message or action from one of the speeches went well or not. Things such as ‘Obamacare’. And from this, tell the President whether to emphasise a popular subject or avoid one in his next address.
Social media is used in data analytics for campaigns
Narwhal created a map of the US-based purely on social media activity around the election. Meaning the team could see the strength of support in a particular state by studying mined data. Then targeting undecided voters, persuading them to vote for Obama. In the year before the Election Day, 100 Data Analysts running 66,000+ data simulations daily, pushing the campaign forward. During October of the presidential campaign, Obama’s team spent a lot on advertising online. Almost double the amount ($52 million) than rival Mitt Romney.
The total spend for the victorious Obama campaign came to over $1.5 billion. If Obama’s victory showed anything, it was that this money did not go to waste. Whether Obama’s widespread appeal and charisma would have won him the 2012 election alone is something we will never know. But, the impact that studying the raw data from social media is clear. Now, the 2016 presidential campaigns will consider social media other sources of data.
How might Data Science and Analytics help map the political spectrum? And how can it influence voters in the decision-making process?
One aspect could be using Artificial Intelligence for speech-writing for political leaders
Using an AI platform to analyse petabytes of raw data from social media, news websites, and blogs. It can interpret what the majority of people are looking for from their politicians. Using this to create a speech from scratch. This brings about concerns of making traditional speechwriters obsolete. However, AI may struggle to create the emotion that is the basis of any successful political address.
The issues of Data Privacy are likely to become a topic of interest with the voting population. It could cause people to stay off social media during election weeks and avoid marketing. We could see analysts digging further into people’s internet searches and past social media. Using this data to try and sway their vote. Studying their online shopping habits and the online newspapers they read. We could see presidential candidates focussing too much on targeting the millennial vote.
We’ve posed a great deal of ‘what if’s’ to think about here. Under the shiny exterior of Data Analytics, what lurks beneath is a great deal murkier. Much like modern politics. You only have to watch House of Cards to understand the lengths that politicians will go to secure power. While there’s an argument to say that it’s just television, how can we be so sure that it is far from the truth? If only one thing is certain, it is that the use of Data Science in politics is set only to expand in the coming years.
