This is President Obama "Slow Jammin" the news with Jimmy Fallon. Fricking brilliant. To give you some background, Jimmy was talking to the UNC audience about student loans and President Obama joined him in that conversation. Instead of doing a typical political interview, they got their point across in a way that was funny, relevant and relatable to their audience. The video by the way has more than 2.3 million views and it's only been up for 2 days.
I am sure some may say this is a desperate move for the president. They may say he is trying to get cheap votes or win a popularity contest. Maybe he is, I don't know. Whether you agree with the message or not, there is no denying that the Obama camp gets social media and viral marketing. They get their demographic, they gets them excited and how they consume their news.
Imagine if President Obama did an interview on the matter, do you seriously think it would have gone viral the way it has? Do you think young people would like that interview on their Facebook walls, share it in their Twitter streams or +1 it on Google+?
Whether or not the republicans will try and follow with more social media efforts to win the youth vote remains to be seen. I know in the last election they certainly did try, getting Sarah Palin and McCain on Saturday Night Live. That however, didn't work as well. It felt more like the chest club trying to join the "cool kids party" if you know what I mean.
It will be interesting to see if that changes in the next election. I guess we'll have to watch our Twitter feeds to find out.
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