The Provincial Election Online Campaign Locally

I thought I would take a look at how the local candidates are doing using the biggest social networking tool out there - Facebook - in their election campaigns. It is a free resource and should be a way for people to get in contact with thousands of people. One Liberal candidate, Donny van Dyk in Skeena, has 1325 supporters. Not bad for someone is a rural riding with a low population.

I will take a look at this again in a week or so.

Here is how the local candidates are doing, unless I note something different, these are fan page numbers:

Victoria Beacon Hill

• Carole James - 1752 She is the leader and should be doing much better than that
• Dallas Henault - 478
• Adam Saab - 153 on fan page and 319 on facebook group
  
• Bob Savage - nothing - BC Refed has no resources and does not seem to know how to use the internet.

Victoria Swan Lake

• Rob Fleming - 480 (my apologies to my MLA, I made a mistake earlier and thought he did not have a page, this is the edited version)
  
• Jesse McClinton - 417
• David Wright - nothing

Oak Bay Gordon Head

• Jessica Van Der Veen - 435 in a facebook group
• Ida Chong - 130
• John Stevens - nothing

Saanich South

• Lana Popham - 161
• Robin Adair - 134
• Brian Gordon - nothing

Saanich North and the Islands

• Tom Bradfield - 11
• Murray Coell - nothing
• Gary Holman - nothing

Esquimalt Royal Roads

• Maurine Karajianis - 418
• Jane Sterk - 130 This is really bad for the Greens, their leader should have at least 10 000 supporters online if they had any sense of how to use the internet to campaign
  
• Carl Ratsoy - nothing

Juan de Fuca

• Jody Twa - 277 in a facebook group
• John Horgan - 262
• James Powell - nothing

I am very surprised that the Greens are doing so badly with the online stuff, they should be working hard in that area because they are more popular with younger voters that are online.

Take Carole James out of the mix, I am also surprised that not a single candidate seems to have more supporters than many people have as friends on Facebook. Clearly they are not going out to get people to join their fan page or their facebook group.

No one seems to get the online campaigning world or take it seriously.

The top ten in the region:

1. Carole James - 1752
2. Rob Fleming - 480
3. Dallas Henault - 478
4. Jessica Van Der Veen - 435
5. Maurine Karajianis - 418
6. Jesse McClinton - 417
7. Adam Saab - 319
   
8. Jody Twa - 277
9. John Horgan - 262
10. Lana Popham - 161

You can see, in relative terms, the NDP is doing well. Jane Sterk does not even break the top ten. Two sitting MLAs do not make the list, Murray Coell and Ida Chong.