by Paul Bedard

May 2, 2011

The vocal birther even beats Obama in terms of online buzz

Donald Trump isn't just a tour de force in real estate, gambling, and TV reality shows. With his emerging presidential campaign based in part on doubting President Obama's heritage, he has swamped the Internet with stories and social media buzz about his every move and utterance.

According to Zeta Interactive, the digital marketing firm that mines thousands of Internet blogs and sites for Washington Whispers to determine the online buzz of political figures, Trump has surpassed the huge post-election buzz of Obama.

"With an overall Zeta Buzz ranking of 19.61 thus far in 2011, Donald Trump would have placed as the best buzzed political figure of all of 2010, had this been last year. Last year's top buzzed political figure was President Obama, who came in with an overall Zeta Buzz ranking of 14.11. At 19.61, Trump's current buzz ranking is more than 5 points higher than Obama's 2010 ranking," said Zeta's latest report to us.

Other highlights:

Tim Pawlenty is the second-most buzzed about GOP presidential candidate, edging out Mitt Romney with the tone of the buzz and internet chatter is accounted for. And our report is bad news for some of the others, including Newt Gingrich and Mike Huckabee.

Al DiGuido, CEO of Zeta Interactive, said, "It's clear in looking at the Zeta Buzz data that, leveraging the incredible notoriety of his brand thru his exposure on TV and mass media, Donald Trump has become a flashpoint in terms of the GOP horse race for the 2012 nomination. What is interesting is that as the overall volume of his posts increases dramatically, the cluster words surrounding this surge focus little on his presidential platform and much more on his wealth and TV show. In order for Trump to make a significant move in terms of being a viable contender he must use this massive exposure to speak more directly and succinctly around his plans to attack the real issues affecting the American voting public.

We have recent memory of then actor Ronald Reagan who successfully transformed his notoriety and public appeal as an actor into popular support and respect for the ideas and policies and in doing so built a strong coalition of voters that ushered him into the White House.

Mr. Trump would be wise to take a page out of this playbook should he want to be considered a viable contender come the fall primaries.

He adds that Trump is seen as a celeb, while Romney is seen as the Republican front runner, and his cluster words indicate growing support and stability in his base. Here is the report:

Person

Volume
Ranking
Tonal
Ranking
Zeta Buzz
Ranking
Cluster Word Analysis

* Volume buzz represents average posts per day since January 1st, 2011
* Tonal buzz represents positive/negative % of buzz for all posts since January 1st, 2011
* Zeta Buzz rating represents combination of both volume and tonal score (higher the ranking, the better the score)
* Cluster word analysis represents 5 of the 30 most popular words or phrases used to describe each person in posts since January 1st, 2011
1. Donald Trump 233.5 84/16 19.61 "Billionaire", "Apprentice", "Show", "show", "Rich"
2. Tim Pawlenty 159.6 87/13 13.89 "President", "Candidate", "Book", "Republican", "Minnesota"
3. Mitt Romney 172.9 78/22 13.49 "Values", "nomination", "lead", "win", "hope"
4. Mike Huckabee 112.5 77/23 8.66 "TV", "budget", "election", "office", "ads"
5. Newt Gingrich 118.1 61/39 7.2 "Conservative" "long shot", "lose", "show", "personality"

 

OVERALL HIGHLIGHTS:

-- Donald 'Trumps' All When it Comes to Buzz: Of all five candidates we analyzed, Donald Trump is currently receiving the best overall Zeta Buzz ranking, which factors in both volume and tone of posts for each candidate. Trump's overall Zeta Buzz ranking was 19.61, which places him more than 6 points ahead of the next-best candidate, Tim Pawlenty. To put Trump's 19.61 Zeta Buzz ranking in perspective, this is more than 5 points higher than Barack Obama's Zeta Buzz ranking in 2010, when he claimed the top spot for buzziest political figure of the year.

-- Trump '11 Buzz Ranking Stronger Than All in '10: With an overall Zeta Buzz ranking of 19.61 thus far in 2011, Donald Trump would have placed as the best buzzed political figure of all of 2010, had this been last year. Last year's top buzzed political figure was President Obama, who came in with an overall Zeta Buzz ranking of 14.11. At 19.61, Trump's current buzz ranking is more than 5 points higher than Obama's 2010 ranking. ,

-- Trump and Pawlenty Most Positive Buzzed Candidates: Tim Pawlenty and Donald Trump are currently the only two candidates of these five to be receiving a tonal buzz ranking of 80% or better since the beginning of the year. Pawlenty leads the pack with 87% positive tone, while Trump finished second with 84% positive buzz.

-- Gingrich Suffering Lowest Tonal Ranking: Of all political figures on this list, Newt Gingrich is currently receiving the lowest tonal buzz ranking at just 61% positive. This is a stark contrast from 2010, when Gingrich was the 7th most buzzed about political figure in the United States, and received a tonal ranking of 81% positive buzz.

-- Trump Still Seen as TV Star First: While Donald Trump is receiving the best overall buzz of all candidates on the list, he continues to be viewed as a TV/celebrity first and foremost, and his potential candidacy for the White House remains an afterthought. For example, of the most popular words and phrases used to describe Trump online since January 1st, the words "billionaire", "Apprentice", "TV, "show" and "rich" were all featured in the Top 20, while no mention of his potential run for the office was included.

-- Huckabee Associated with Ads: Interestingly, Mike Huckabee was the only candidate to be associated with his publicity efforts, as the word "ads" and "TV" was featured among the Top 5 most popular words and phrases used to describe Huckabee online.

-- Gingrich Remains Long Shot in Buzz: Newt Gingrich's buzz is currently being dominated with words reflective of his far-from-positive tonal buzz rating. For example, "long shot" and "lose" were featured among his most popular cluster words. Interestingly, Gingrich is also the only candidate of the five to have the word "conservative" listed in his most popular cluster words.

-- Romney Experiences Volume Surge From Last Year: While Mitt Romney is currently in the middle of the pack of these five candidates when it comes to overall buzz, his volume score of 172.9 represents a 35% increase from his volume score last year. In all of 2010, Romney racked in a volume average of 111.5 posts per day, while so far this year, his average amount of daily posts is 172.9, placing him second to only Donald Trump in the volume category.

-- Values and Hope Associated with Romney Campaign: Of all candidates on this list, Romney was the only one to be directly associated with the phrases "values" and "hope" in his cluster analysis. Additionally, while he is currently in 3rd place in the buzz standings, the blogosphere seems to be viewing him as a frontrunner in the GOP race, with the word "lead" being featured among his most popular cluster words.

 

Receive our political analysis by email by subscribing here



Donald Trump: Most Buzzed About GOP Candidate | Politics

© Tribune Media Services