Yesterday, Kate Kaye - Senior Editor at ClickZ stopped by DAG to talk to us about her new book, Campaign '08: A Turning Point For Digital Media.

Kate was in town for the #POLC09 conference, to moderate my panel on Social Media Analytics.

Here's a brief video of Kate explaining how McCain and Obama's campaign leveraged online advertising:

A few highlights:

While the conventional wisdom has the McCain campaign getting blown away by Obama online - that's not entirely the case when it comes to paid media.

For example, McCain had some really smart people running his paid media - particular his Google Adwords - and saw excellent results.

However, McCain's advertising was not integrated with the larger campaign message while Obama's was - the team did not have a "seat at the adult table" as Kate aptly puts it. Further the scale of Obama's online ad buys, dwarfed McCain's.

Hungry for more info? Good, then go out and get the book right now.

As a conservative Internet consultant based in Washington, DC I've been anticipating this day - election day - for nearly two years. While some voters regrettably only pay attention in the final days before casting their vote, I've been watching the candidates like a hawk to see how they've been using (or being used by) the Internet.

Regardless of which candidate you're voting for, I believe we're standing at the beginning of a brighter day for democracy and good government. Citizen participation is expected to increase dramatically which means more people will have bought in to the democratic process. I believe that's a good thing because the winner will eventually have to answer to a giant, sweaty citizen-mob who can't wait to stand up and make an impact on the process of governing.

Participation has increased throughout the campaign because politicians have been reaching Americans where they spend a heckuva lot a time: the Internet. Websites and watering holes like MySpace and others have played an important role in helping fuel the people-powered revolution of American politics. Because of this need to reach citizens wherever they may congregate we face the very real reality of having a weekly Presidential address live-streamed to the American people. Indeed the first modern presidency is near.

Both John McCain and Barack Obama have made it clear that they will use the Internet to communicate effectively if in office. More than a year ago I was on a bloggers conference call with Senator McCain where he said as much in response to my question on the issue. As for Barack, technology advisers close to him have told me that Barack will deploy the Internet throughout his Administration to improve government.

We've just begun assessing what it all means but we know that after tonight it'll never be the same. The Internet has improved the political process for candidates, citizens, and democracy. The naysayers who feared the Internet were once again proven wrong.

And I expect political geeks like me won't have to wait long for the next campaign. After all, it's days away from starting.

Another socnet has just launched - The Right-Wing Facebook, it's a parody site sponsored by the monster liberal organization, People for the American Way. The site has profiles for all the Republican presidential candidates and links to their "friends" in the Conservative movement like Dr. Dobson and Gary Bauer. As you can guess, the profiles aren't very flattering.

It's obvious that PFAW has put a lot of thought and time into this parody site, and I have to give a lot of credit to the guys who put this together - it's good. The profiles are clever and it's a great way to disseminate all of the opposition research and hits that the liberals have collected on the Republican candidates.

So... what conservative organization is going to create The Left-Wing Facebook?

(H/T Wonkette)

Cross-Posted to DAG.

UPDATE: I failed to mention that the event was co-sponsored by Waggener Edstrom Worldwide.

Yesterday morning here in DC several modern media communicators on the 2008 presidential campaigns got together to talk shop at event co-sponsored by the Politico. I couldn't make it, but I heard that it was a pretty good discussion.

Michelle Oddis over at Human Events was on hand to cover the action though.

“Just judging by the traffic numbers and every other metric online people are a lot more excited about the Democratic candidates online,” said moderator Ben Smith of the Politico.

Smith asked Mindy Finn, Director of e-Strategy for the Mitt Romney for President Campaign, if she thought Republicans could catch up:

“To say that we can’t catch up is sort of ignoring things that have happened before in history. There is a lot of time between now and November 2008…we are still in a primary process. The day that there is a nominee on both sides it becomes a completely different race,” said Finn.

Jim VandeHei (also from the Politico and a panel moderator) questioned Finn’s evaluation.

“You guys spend your life thinking about these issues… look a the advantage that the Republicans had because of talk radio and direct mail in the 80’s and 90’s -- and clearly the web seems like the new talk radio and direct mail -- how concerned are you when you look and see that the Democratic campaigns are adapting to this more quickly?” asked VandeHei.

The question of how badly the Dems are beating the GOP at online campaigning has been covered pretty frequently in this space. I think one of the most insightful analysis' of the debate was done by Jonah Goldberg a few months ago.

The gist of his point was that:

The energy is on liberalism's side -- and that translates into success in the digital world. Conservative media and FreeRepublic-style activists prospered in the Clinton 1990s because that's when they were on offense. And it's always more exciting -- and easier -- to be on offense. In the Bush years, it's the other way around.

The real question in my mind is not whether or not Republicans will catch-up, it's when. Will we be able to match the Democrats online efforts by November '08, or will it take a Hillary Clinton presidency for Republicans to embrace the modern world?

Let's hope the GOP sees the light sooner rather then later.

MySpace, MTV team up on candidate dialogues
by Foon Rhee, deputy national political editor for the Boston Globe

The presidential campaign continues apace in the online world of the young.

MySpace and MTV announced today that they will team up on a series of dialogues on college campuses with candidates that will be broadcast on television and on the web.

Students on site and viewers will be able to submit questions, and live online polling will gauge reaction, the companies said.

The first hour-long dialogue will feature Democrat John Edwards and is to take place in New Hampshire on Sept. 27. In the Democratic field, Hillary Clinton, Chris Dodd, Barack Obama and Bill Richardson have agreed to take part. Among Republicans, Sam Brownback, Rudy Giuliani, Duncan Hunter, John McCain, Ron Paul, and Mitt Romney have committed. More here.

From Voice of America News:
Voters will be able to instant-message, e-mail or text message their questions during the discussions, which will also include online viewers' responses to candidates' answers. College students attending the forums will also be able to ask questions.