Politics and the Art of Listening

Charlene Li and Josh Bernoff's book Groundswell discusses the impact that social media, has had on the marketing and public relations. One of the major points is how to take advantage of the rising trends in marketing and PR where the power has shifted to be more in the hands of consumers and a brand is what the people make of it.

Chapter 5 of the book discusses the importance of listening to the groundswell and how proper listening and how actively listening to the groundswell and your customers and target audience can drastically affect your business.  One of the parts that particularly stuck with me was the idea that by listening to the groundswell can actively diminish the "no-more-being-stupid factor". And how negative reviews and comments can point out just how bad some of the things company's do.  Let's apply listening to something that's been in the news a lot recently and will continue to be in the news for the next year. The 2016 presidential election.  Let's look specifically at the campaign of Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders.

Bernie Sanders

Bernie Sanders whose twitter can be found here and campaign site is located here has focused his campaign on the issues that are affecting middle and lower class America. His campaign has focused on issues such as raising the minimum wage, lowering the cost of education, addressing income and wealth disparity in the United States.  This is a message that has resonated with many American people, and led to a campaign that has seemingly risen from the ground up.

Bernie Sanders and Seattle

Earlier in his campaign Senator Sanders had a speech in Seattle interrupted by members of the Black Lives Matter movement.  During a scheduled campaign stop in Seattle, members of the movement stopped Senator Sanders from speaking, and instead addressed their own important agenda, and throughout the speech, Senator Sanders didn't try to stop them or interrupt, but instead stood back and listened to their message.  His campaign later arranged with prominent members of the larger movement to discuss policy.

Bernie Sanders and Campaign Finance

You also may have seen this image talking about Bernie's donors in comparison to Hillary's.
 
While this picture isn't 100% accurate to the 2016 election solely because data isn't completely available yet, it is an accurate representation of both candidates received donations throughout their political careers.

Bernie Sanders on Being Liberal