The 2020 Election Day has continued on from beginning on Tuesday and it is still in progress. Some media outlets are reflecting that they do not think that the official results of the election will be in until at least November 14. The anticipation for who will be the next president has media outlets, United States citizens and people across the world tuning into their social media in order to know updated results in real time.
Journalists for this election have been able to utilize social media more than they have ever been able to before. While main outlets such as Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram are the most used outlets, Tik Tok, Snapchat, and other forms of social media have proven to be highly influential in this election. For our class project, my group was in charge of setting up a Facebook live and explaining coverage of the election.
Our group decided to hold two separate Facebook lives, where the first one would be covering the election on Monday, prior to the actual election day, and then the second would take place on Thursday. With coverage on two days, it allowed our team to be able to give an update to what the election was predicted to look like and then give an update to what was going on.
I personally do not believe that Facebook live was the best form of social media to use in covering the election. The reason for this is because our Facebook live is not going to be as effective for media consumers to watch than that of a live television broadcast. If someone is able to watch the news on their television or streaming device and then flip through another social media source while they watch the live results, it is going to give an individual a better look into the election. While our whole team did advertise for our Facebook lives, we were not able to get a large demographic interested in our content. I believe a source such as Twitter or Instagram is able to provide a more timely source of content that is easier for someone to interact with.
I learned that a Facebook live is a great source if you want to have a conversation with other individuals or to even facilitate some sort of debate. However, it is less useful if you’re wanting to grab the attention of people who are already getting their media from so many other sources. For the election specifically, media consumers are already consumed by the media they are receiving from every social media platform they are on to the television they are consuming. It is unlikely that when they are going to Facebook they are looking for another source of news coverage.
From looking at my peers social media accounts, I was able to see that they displayed a lot of accurate and updated information that was readable and kept me interested. The Twitter group did a fantastic job of curating information that was timely and was quick so that it fell in nicely with the other news I was consuming. The Instagram group was also successful in creating content that was manageable to consume and that would grab the attention of individuals to consume their creation.
Social media has provided countless updates for this election, not just through polling numbers or what each candidate is saying, but also through hearing from individuals about their own thoughts and feelings of the election. Being able to cover news on social media has allowed journalists, including journalism students, the opportunity to extend the platform farther and be able to reach more individuals.
Delaney Tureson 