Just got quoted by Robert Scoble on my post about John Edwards announcing his candidacy on YouTube. 

I had a couple more thoughts - many ideas "come to me" as I write, sorta like inspiration - and now that see his staffers logging onto my blog to take a look (saw 40-50 coming on in the last hour or so) it's a good time to mention thoughts I've had about political metrics.  

First, using Scoble's mention it was easy to identify  traffic pattern of Edwards' staffers as they all came to my homepage (they did not find it on search engines - the referral was Scoble's mention of me). 

Thanks Robert - we've met once or twice - very briefly at Webmasterworld Pubcon Boston last year and the another blogging conference in NYC in 2005. 

Here's what Scoble had to say:

"…..By the way, I sat next to reporters from Washington Post and Los Angeles Times. They told me they pay every part of the trip and won’t accept free travel or other things.

The problem is how do average citizens do trips like this and get access if they have to pay their own way? That’s going to be a problem. Maybe bloggers should start an association to pay for their own representatives to go on trips like this. That way we’ll make sure we keep our independence and credibility, while getting access to things like this.

Heheh, the staff is looking at Webmetrics right now to see what kind of increase in mentions they are seeing on the Web."

Sounds like a great opportunity - don't think I could afford to pay my own way (or have the time to do it right now - but I'm glad John Edwards is embracing bloggers - and it sound like a great place to be).   I can contribute with metrics, thoughts about it, at this point.  It also would be nice to be able to blog about this from time to time.  It's nice to see bloggers being embraced - because it's been shown that bloggers are influentials.

I think Howard Dean started this (using the Internet effectively to mobilize - but I think more is possible - and not everything needs to be created from scratch)

FeedBurner is improving it's RSS Feed Metrics - and it looks like you'll be able to geolocate RSS subscribers.   I believe the candidate that can best organize their subscribers will probably win (even against "voting irregularities" - which seem to be something you can almost "expect" - might as well plan around them).

There's a lot of problems with trying to Geo Locate Subscribers as not everyone can be geolocated easily (when I'm at work it looks like I'm in Durham, NC when I'm really in NYC) but there are also workarounds and new solutions (which I occasionally hear about).

Perhaps the best solution for a candidate, at this point, is to create custom RSS Feeds for each subscriber - and collect the address of that subscriber when they sign-up (and be able to match up the data you collect on each subscriber with the web data - even programs like Salesforce.com can do some of this - it's hooking up the data with web metrics that's the hardest thing to do); you can then track the activity of each subscriber, perhaps on several levels.  Here's when it gets interesting.  I think the technology can support this right now; but it does take planning.

In theory(I haven't done it - but I can "see it") - you can segment by location - see how your doing (forget about the pollsters - look at your metrics and make your own decisions based on good data - which, again, might not always be easy to get - have to PLAN for it NOW). 

…instead of those expensive "phone calls" just before election day - that no one listens to - because they're "unremarkable" and too obtrusive (aka Seth Godin) - he knows what makes something "remarkable" - you get RSS feed message- right down to the district level - to the block level from the candidate.

Think how powerful that can be - if its done well (and it's inexpensive, actually)

Using metrics you might  be able to set it up to determine how many have "read" the messages and have a good idea of who's going to actually SHOW UP and vote.

You can also mobilize before elections by sending out personalized messages via RSS.

At this time, you'd not want to let the number of subscribers (sign-ups, if you want to call it that) you have in every district of the country be public knowledge - but you want to know how many you have (and how many you need to have in every district to win) and you'll be able to communicate via RSS Feeds to your subscribers by district - (by block level - if you have to).  It's all in the planning.

You can supplement all of this with Podcasts (which you can track the number of downloads of), Videocasts, emails (which you'd want to tie into metrics as well).  All of this actually makes human contact possible (it does not take away the human element - it actually augments it).

If you have a large enough subscriber base - and it's coordinated (and backed up well) …..  That's what I saw today - it just "came" to me.

So, every district has a goal - what you need to have to win in that district (you'll know that that goal is).  OK, not everyone is computer literate - not everyone is going to want to get data in RSS Feeds, not everyone uses Meetup.com (which is pretty darn sophisticated - it's gotten possible to datamine it as well) - so you still have to do regular media buys - but not nearly as much.  Much more can be accomplished this way, I feel.

I would also think in terms of having a license to HitWise (more for trending - no service is good enough to bank on - but with HitWise you can do "cause and effect" tracking based on traffic which is not really possible to do with the free tools out there - they're not precise enough in my opinion.  If your going to spend money - spend it on RSS feed development, HitWise and possibly Brand Pulse (for feedback). 

Why Brand Pulse (or something like it)?   Because your going to need to be able to pickup and categorize positive and negative feedback from blogs and message boards and mainstream media very quickly - and the free tools can't do it - but the more advanced and (expensive) tools can.  Sure, you can get some talented programmers to write you something like this - but it's probably more effective to just use what's actually out there - because a lot of money and time has gone into developing these tools - in this case - you'll probably want the best tools for metrics.

Categorization is the key - it's the key to web analytics - it's probably also the key to this.   By the way, all of these tools are a drop in the bucket to what you'd pay for one or two MSM commercials.  Perhaps BrandPulse would be the most expensive part (depends on how customized you want to track feedback).

IN order to understand all this "data" that's flooding in - you need to be able to categorize it QUICKLY - so the campaign can make a decision on it.  At least, to understand what might be happening - so you can do something about it.

One thing that's become clear - as technology has evolved - the ability to react
quickly has become even more important - a debate is constantly going on and you need to be "plugged in" or it still goes on but without your participation.

Look what happened to Dell when they had "burning laptops" and did not immediately counter (they waited a month to start a blog); or the famous Kryptonite Lock issue, or even this new thing with the Microsoft / Edelman ACER Vista Laptops they were giving away free to bloggers (to review Vista) - in one day - Microsoft had to change their story about the laptops (and that may have been too long). 

Another thought - and it's all around us now - Second Life.   Sure, the population of Second Life is only 2 million or so, and only 20,000 are online at any time, so far, but it's possible - perhaps - to put some thought into having a presence there - in Second Life.

For one thing - it's a way to bypass space and time (to have virtual meetings where it's not possible to be together physically) and also, high end businesses have been embracing Second Life.   It's an idea I've floated to some of my clients (ie: if your an architect - and one of mine is - how about having an Island in Second Life with some of the best house plans the architect's firm creates - so you can be "inside of one" and then make a decision about it.   Or say…the Edwards campaign has an office in "Second Life" and anyone who wants to ….visit the Edwards "office" can just go there whenever they want.  Why not?  It makes sense to me.

For example, you could hold press conferences in Second Life - along with real life conferences - and this will be covered very well in BLOGS -which is a segment you want to reach and fan.

Finally- custom development of Widgets that can make it easier to communicate with the campaign and coordinate are probably a good way to spend money - again.  Except - you also want to go after the 3G mobile technology….. why?  Because many of the people who are going to vote - whose votes you need use mobile devices as their primary communication device - you can see that by reading Smartmobs.com, where I also post to.  And the Mobile phone - will also give the campaign the ability to mobilize people on the ground, in real time.

Eventually, this will lead to the next class of mobile devices - Ultra Portable Mobile PC's which are now coming on the market - for the same prices as the most expensive mobile phones.  Anyway - it's fair to say 2008 will be dominated by the Internet - by mobile communication, perhaps by Second Life, and certainly by RSS Feeds (along with Podcasts and Vidcasts, etc).  The metrics need to be built around that - all of it - and in a way where you can take the data and utilize it, in real time, on a district by district basis.   If you have the districts down, you have the city, if you have the city's and suburbs, you have the states, if you have states (enough of them) you have the country.   I've rambled enough on this tonight.

I hope this helps and I'm glad for link from Scoble - that's a first for me. Thanks Robert.