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View Full Version : Promoting Ron Paul on Digg without Bury-blowback




angio10sin
08-08-2007, 03:13 PM
So, I've noticed that there's some serious resistance popping up on social bookmarking sites (such as Digg) for stories about Ron Paul... so I wanted to offer up an idea about how to promote Ron Paul without getting the story buried, so here's the scoop:

Much of this resistance comes from people who don't even read the articles - they see Ron Paul heavily featured in the headline and bury the article.

There are a lot of articles that exist that show Ron Paul in a positive light or negatively portray other candidates for going after Paul.

Find stories of the second type, where the headline doesn't enrage people, but the content will make them think more about Paul's positions, and digg those stories. Then use the comments section to elaborate on the issue.

An example of a story that is picking up steam on Digg that isn't about Ron Paul but mentions him in positive light and provides a great opportunity for differentiating him from a front-running candidate can be found here:

http://www.digg.com/2008_us_elections/Most_Annoying_Rudy_Giuliani_Debate_Phrases_and_Beh avior

The people who need to be reached are less likely to click on a Ron Paul headline anyway - use stories like this to preach to the people who need to hear the message. Heavily "Ron Paul-ized" headlines are preaching to the choir. Subvert tangentially related pieces and have more effect! Online guerrilla campaigning!

angio10sin
08-08-2007, 03:34 PM
Here's another great article that allows for differentiation of Ron Paul and other candidates - the "front-runners" are so simply because of electability. They offer up misinformation regularly. RP runs a logical, fact based campaign. This is a good one to comment on.

http://www.digg.com/2008_us_elections/Another_Republican_debate_with_more_false_claims

Keith
08-08-2007, 03:35 PM
Thanks. That sounds like good advice, and an excellent first post. Welcome to the forum.

angio10sin
08-08-2007, 03:43 PM
Thanks Keith. I don't know for sure how successful the strategy will be, but it seems to make a lot of sense to me. I wish that there was an easier way to inform people of the non-mainstream candidates (ie mass media), but news coverage today has become about ratings instead of information dissemination. Everything is editorialized - they treat Ron Paul, Mike Huckabee, Dennis Kucinich as fringe candidates, so they become fringe candidates. Giuliani leads on name recognition, not on political philosophy. Thompson presently runs second in national polling because he's a famous television actor. We need to do everything we can to get the American public to view these elections as a serious matter... and if that means steering a loosely related story in the right direction, I'm all for it... you know?

ghemminger
08-08-2007, 04:05 PM
I really like this idea...I will keep a look out for these types of articles.

angio10sin
08-08-2007, 05:37 PM
Glad to see others think the idea has merit. RP has been getting lots of digg love today. I've got my eyes open for other good articles - I'll post back here as I find them.