Selling the Biden Boom
Also inside: Facebook allows the Daily Wire to spend $1 million on anti-vax ads
This week was a big one for those of us tracking the internet and politics. We laughed, we cried, we feared for the future of democracy, and we learned about the Vice President’s preference for wired headphones. More importantly, we saw signs of optimism for a “Biden Boom” amid positive economic news that could put wind in the sails of the Build Back Better agenda. How is the White House talking about the economic recovery online? We’ll break that down + more in this week’s FWIW.
But first...
By the numbers
FWIW, here were the top political ad spenders on Facebook + Instagram last week:
The Daily Wire was again one of the biggest ad spenders on Facebook last week - in fact, they’ve spent $1.13 million on Facebook ads alone in the past four weeks. The far-right site advertises through several different pages, including Ben Shapiro, Daily Wire, Matt Walsh, and Candace Owens, and their most recent ads express a rabid anti-vaccine viewpoint. Despite claims of supporting vaccines, Facebook seems happy to take their money.
Other major advertisers last week included the International Rescue Committee and Defenders of Wildlife, which spent a lot of money to raise a lot of money in honor of #GivingTuesday.
Speaking of Facebook (or Meta, whatever), a new report out this week detailed how the company failed to properly categorize thousands of political ads in last year’s elections. This report probably won’t come as a surprise to our readers, as we have regularly flagged ads over the years that have violated the company’s stated policies.
Meanwhile, here were the top political ad spenders on Google platforms last week:
With the exception of the NRSC and Save America, political spending on Google platforms was minimal. Most of this week’s top advertisers remained unchanged since last week, with the exception of Climate Power, who is back with some strong video ads to get Build Back Better across the finish line:
And lastly, here’s what year-to-date political & issue ad spending on Snapchat looks like:
In the past week, the fight for abortion rights played out in Snapchat advertising, with four groups - PPNCS, SheroMS, Avow, and Live Action launching new campaigns.
In recent weeks, anti-choice group Live Action has spent heavily to capitalize on anti-abortion lawsuits playing out across the country. The organization is the only conservative advertiser to break into the top 10 spender list on Snapchat this year.
Selling the Biden Boom
As a reminder of how quickly the political winds can change, the Biden Boom has arrived. The header of the Drudge Report last night (which receives more than 500 million page views per month) led with the following:
“JOBLESS CLAIMS LOWEST IN HALF CENTURY...“ “Biden delivering fastest recovery in history?” “CRAMER: Economy is 'a juggernaut' now...'Strongest I've Ever Seen'...”
The White House is well poised to capitalize on this wave of good economic news. Their team has been pushing several pieces of content, including this Washington Monthly article and this piece in the Hill. Out of curiosity, we did a scan of the top-performing Facebook posts by interactions about the economy this week, including terms like “higher prices, inflation, unemployment, economic recovery.”
Surprisingly, the top post was this one from the President’s official page:
Yesterday, White House Chief of Staff (and one of our O.G. FWIW readers) Ron Klain released another one of his famous chart videos. During the 2020 campaign, he used these explainers with charts and whiteboards to outline Biden’s plans for COVID response. Now, he’s back to sell the economic recovery:
However, in order to get a fuller picture of the White House’s social strategy, you have to look beyond official accounts. Their team knows that leveraging other people’s followings is a much more efficient way to expand their reach. For example, the White House partnered with Bill Nye for a TikTok collab that was shared a little over a week ago. The video (watch below), touts the benefits of the Build Back Better agenda - and it’s racked up over 2.4 million views and nearly 600,000 interactions. 🏆
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen the White House deploy this tactic. Earlier this year, their partnership with Olivia Rodrigo temporarily broke the internet, and Ciara’s White House visit last month highlighting the importance of vaccinating kids received millions of views on Instagram. We also saw Secretary Mayor Pete have a conversation this week with Insta influencer Amelie Zilber in order to sell the infrastructure bill:
These types of partnerships with high-impact celebrities and influencers are invaluable to progressives as we seek to compete with the Right online. Traditionally, organizations and political groups have focused on building their own brands, digital campaigns, and followings - at a great cost of labor and resources. They should obviously still do that too, but partnering with friendly, high-following individuals is a shortcut to getting out one’s message to the masses quickly and efficiently.
Q&A with digital-first Delegate-Elect Irene Shin
What’s it like to go from working on political campaigns to running for office yourself? In this week’s issue of Campaigner, we spoke with Del-Elect Irene Shin, a longtime political and nonprofit staffer who ran for office in Virginia this year, defeated an incumbent in the primary and won the general election last month. Her campaign was known for trying new tactics to reach voters - and it ultimately paid off. Read the full interview here>>