If Twitter Had Its Own Primary, Ron Paul Would Be Winning

The Republican Primaries are underway, with two states already in the rearview mirror. The second primary, New Hampshire, wrapped up last night. Mitt Romney took home the most votes from New Hampshire voters, winning just about every county and beating out Ron Paul, who came in second, followed by Jon Huntsman, Newt Gingrich, and Rick Santorum, rounding out the pack.

With social media playing an increasingly important role in spreading political messages and news, Crimson Hexagon, a company that specializes in social media analytics, delved into the Twittersphere to find out which of the candidates is being discussed most positively online.

Although Romney has already taken home two victories, it seems that Ron Paul is still the most discussed — and most positively discussed — candidate. From January 6th through the end of the New Hampshire primary, Ron Paul was the more actively discussed candidate, 26 percent to 22 percent and edged out Romney in the number of positive mentions on Twitter by a margin of 3 percent.

Today, in the aftermath of last night’s results, Paul continued to both be more actively discussed, receiving more positive mentions on the social network than Romney — 14 percent to 12 percent.

Somewhat ironically, although each of the Republican candidates’ Twitter accounts were alive and well, on the day of the New Hampshire primary, President Obama still managed to outdo the posse in terms of volume of tweets, firing out 4 more tweets than Rick Santorum, the most active republican tweeter, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Of course, Obama’s Twitter account is run by his campaign staff, as are most politicians’. And number of Twitter followers won’t win you an election, although it can certainly help spread the message.

Below you can see the full breakdown of the Twitter discussion of the top two finishing Republican candidates. Though Ron Paul lost last night, his supporters have been active over the last week; his second place finish last night and top spot in positive discussion on Twitter may be, at the least, a moral victory going forward.

So if you’re Ron Paul, just based on the numbers, it’s time to turn that attention to Twitter, especially over Facebook, where Mitt Romney both has more “Likes” and is being more actively discussed than Paul.

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