Analyzing the Presidential Candidate Videos on YouTube



Analyzing the Presidential Candidate Videos on YouTube

by Professor Edward Lee

The Utube Blog

website:

email: utubeblog@

phone: 614-292-3201

Research assistant:

Craig Goldschmidt

August 2007

Abstract

This report examines the use and popularity of videos posted on YouTube by the presidential candidates for the upcoming 2008 election. In March 2007, YouTube launched a service on its website called “You Choose ’08,” which provided each candidate a channel on YouTube for the posting of campaign videos. The videos of all the candidates were located on a webpage of YouTube for ease of finding (). All of the presidential candidates from the Democratic and Republican parties have participated in YouTube’s “You Choose ’08,” although it should be noted that the candidates started posting on YouTube at different times (one as early as December 2006), typically depending on when they joined the campaign. Each candidate decides what videos to post on YouTube and when they are posted. This report analyzes the popularity of each candidate’s videos on YouTube, in terms of both (i) the number of views the candidates’ videos have received on YouTube and (ii) the number of subscribers each candidate’s channel on YouTube has generated.

We have reached two basic findings for the presidential candidate videos thus far: (1) the presidential candidates have gained only a relatively modest amount of views and subscribers to their YouTube videos; and (2) Republican candidate Ron Paul is, by a wide margin, the most popular candidate on YouTube, in terms of the average number of views per video and the number of subscribers to his YouTube channel. He also has the most total views on YouTube for any presidential candidate.

About The Utube Blog

Professor Edward Lee, a specialist in intellectual property and in law, technology, and innovation, teaches at the Moritz College of Law at The Ohio State University. He also runs and edits The Utube Blog (), which provides up-to-date news and analysis of the video-sharing industry. The Utube Blog is not affiliated, sponsored, or connected in any way with YouTube or any other company. Nor is it affiliated, sponsored, or connected in any way with any presidential candidate. The results of this study should not be considered an endorsement of any candidate, Democratic or Republican.

Methodology

For this study, we included data from all videos posted on YouTube’s “You Choose ’08” program by the presidential candidates, except if a candidate had posted the video within the past 7 days (prior to collecting the data) and the video had received less than 1,000 views. We excluded these latter, more recent videos from our calculations because we did not want the short time of the video’s posting on YouTube to skew the study on the popularity of videos or unfairly affect a candidate’s overall average number of views per video. A very recent video may not have adequate time to generate many views. We took the numbers of views and subscribers from YouTube’s public information indicated for each video or candidate. We then used Microsoft Excel and simple math formulas to generate the totals and averages from the data we obtained from YouTube.

We collected data in the first week of both July 2007 and August 2007. On the graphs below, data for the candidates are arranged alphabetically by party, with Democrats on the left and Republicans on the right. On the graphs (where color is viewable), red represents Republican candidates, while blue represents Democratic candidates.

Analysis

We examined the popularity of candidate videos on YouTube at the beginning of July 2007 and again at the beginning of August 2007.

A. Views of YouTube Videos Posted by the Presidential Candidates

YouTube keeps track of the number of times a video hosted on its site is viewed or played. The number of views does not necessarily mean the number of people who have watched the video. A person can watch the same video on different occasions on YouTube, and each time constitutes a “view” of the video.

1. Average Number of Views Per Video for Each Candidate

We first examined the average number of views each candidate generated on YouTube per video by July 2007, as shown below:

[pic]

Only 5 candidates (Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Sam Brownback, Duncan Hunter, and Ron Paul) generated over 20,000 views per video. The majority (10 of 17 candidates) did not generate over 10,000 views per video. Ron Paul had the best average viewership, generating over 60,000 views per video (62,733 views per video). Hillary Clinton placed second with just under 40,000 views per video (38,341 views per video).

By the beginning of August 2007, the numbers did not change significantly, except in the case of Ron Paul, who significantly increased his average views per video and his lead over the other candidates, as shown below:

[pic]

Because the candidates added more videos to YouTube in the prior month, some of the candidates even saw a decrease in their average views per video. Only 2 candidates (Hillary Clinton and Ron Paul) generated over 20,000 views per video, but the majority (9 of 16 candidates; Jim Gilmore dropped out) generated over 10,000 views per video. Ron Paul had the best average viewership, generating nearly 85,000 views per video (84,088 views per video), an increase of over 20,000 views per video on average. Hillary Clinton placed second with over 30,000 views per video (33,581 views per video), although her average decreased from the previous month. Ron Paul had more than double the average number of views per video than Hillary Clinton, the closest competitor.

2. Total Number of Views for Each Candidate on YouTube

By July 1, 2007, the candidates received the following total number of views for all their videos combined on YouTube:

[pic]

Only 5 candidates (Hillary Clinton, John Edwards, Barack Obama, Ron Paul, and Mitt Romney) had generated over 1 million views of their videos on YouTube. The majority (11 of 17 candidates) had not generated a half million views. Barack Obama had the most total views, with 2,028,644 views. John Edwards was second with 1,642,650 views.

By the first week of August 2007, all of the candidates (except Jim Gilmore, who dropped out of the race) gained more views during the past month, as shown in the chart below:

[pic]

The gains were relatively modest (typically only a half million views or less), with the exception of Ron Paul, who gained over 1.2 million views in one month to take the lead from Barack Obama as the candidate with most total views on YouTube. Paul’s increase in views more than doubled the increase in views for each of the other candidates in the past month. Obama had the second biggest increase in views with 585,212 more views. By the first week of August 2007, Paul had the most views on YouTube with 2,859,006 views total, while Obama was second with 2,613,856 views and John Edwards third with 2,027,812 views.

3. Single Most Viewed Video for Each Candidate

We next examined the single most popular video for each candidate. The results in July 2007 were as follows:

[pic]

None of the candidates had a video on YouTube that gained close to 1 million views. Hillary Clinton had the most popular video, “I Need Your Advice,” in which she asked viewers to help her select her campaign song during the week in which YouTube featured her video in its “Spotlight,” a one week period during which YouTube highlights one candidate.[1] The Clinton video had 620,367 views. Barack Obama had the second most popular video (545,996 views), “Barack Obama YouTube Spotlight,” in which he discusses how people can make a difference for his YouTube Spotlight video.[2] Although Ron Paul had the highest average views per video and the most views total on YouTube for any candidate, he did not have a single video with 300,000 views or more.

By August 2007, the numbers did not change significantly for most candidates, although Mike Gravel[3] and Rudy Giuliani[4] each posted a video in July during his “YouTube Spotlight” that gained several hundred thousand views. The two top videos of all the candidates gained very few views over the prior month (after their YouTube Spotlight). Hillary Clinton’s video went from 620,367 to 625,618 views, and Barack Obama’s video from 545,996 to 557,472 views.

[pic]

B. Subscribers to Each Presidential Candidate’s YouTube Channel

Finally, we examined the number of subscribers to each candidate’s YouTube channel. A subscriber is a user on YouTube who signs on to another YouTube channel to receive email updates for each new video posted on the channel. (Because a person can have several YouTube accounts with different user names, the number of subscribers does not necessarily mean the actual number of individuals who have subscribed to the YouTube channel. The number of subscriptions can be inflated by users who have multiple YouTube accounts. We have no way of telling whether any inflation occurred in the numbers taken in our study.)

We did not have numbers of subscribers for the first week of July 2007. In the first week of August, the number of subscribers for each candidate was as follows:

[pic]

Only 3 candidates had over 5,000 subscribers on YouTube (Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, and Ron Paul). Ron Paul had, by far, the most subscribers on YouTube, with close to 25,000 subscribers, more than doubling the closest competitor. Barack Obama was second, with nearly 10,000 subscribers.

Conclusion

As of August 6, 2007, the popularity of videos posted on YouTube by the presidential candidates has been modest. No candidate video has generated close to 1 million views—a figure that is typically surpassed by the most popular “viral” videos on YouTube. With the exception of Ron Paul and Hillary Clinton, none of the candidates received over 20,000 views on average per video. The campaign season is still early, however; and other interests among viewers in the summer months should be taken into account. The study also suggests that YouTube’s “Spotlight” program—highlighting one candidate’s video for one week—can generate more attention and viewers for the candidate featured.

Among all the candidates, Ron Paul’s popularity on YouTube stands out. Paul ranks No.1 in three of the four categories measured. By a wide margin, Paul has the most views on average per video (nearly 85,000) and the most subscribers on YouTube (nearly 25,000)—more than doubling the numbers of the closest competitor from any party. He also has the most number of views total on YouTube (over 2.8 million), having gained over 1.2 million views in the past month (which more than doubled the increase in views of each of the other candidates during that time period). The one category in which Paul does not lead the other candidates is the Single Most Viewed Video on YouTube, a category in which Paul places no better than most of the other candidates. The data suggest that Ron Paul’s popularity on YouTube comes from a consistent and respectable number of views for all or most of his videos, instead of one “big hit” video.

We will update these figures as the campaign season progresses.

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[1] Hillary Clinton, “I Need Your Advice,” May 16, 2007, .

[2] Barack Obama, “Barack Obama YouTube Spotlight,” June 13, 2007, .

[3] Mike Gravel, “Mike Gravel Responds to Campaign Finance Question,” July 26, 2007, .

[4] Rudy Giuliani, “You Choose ’08 Spotlight: Rudy on His 12 Commitments,” July 17, 2007, .

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