November 21, 2024
Welcome to The L@B Report
Welcome to this month’s issue of The L@B Report from GSG, bringing you news and insights from the intersection of digital media and public affairs. In this issue, we discuss how the Trump and Harris campaigns used alternative media in the 2024 election, the exodus from X to BlueSky following the election, and advertising on Threads.
This issue of The L@B Report was put together by Ryan Alexander.
In the News
Alternative Media Wins the 2024 Election
Both the Trump and Harris campaigns used podcasts and other forms of alternative media to reach key audiences
Lots of ink has been spilled on post-mortems from the 2024 election, but what caught our eye were articles on how both the Harris and Trump campaigns used alternative forms of media, and podcasts in particular, to reach key voting blocs.
One of the keys to President Trump’s victory was his performance with younger men, a historically low engagement group. Adweek details how Trump’s campaign reached them through a 3-hour interview on Joe Rogan’s podcast, which racked up 26 million views in 24 hours. Trump also did interviews with Instagram creators such as Jake Paul and tapped into Twitch, a video-streaming platform popular with gamers. The Washington Post has a similar article which dives deeper into Trump’s YouTube, Instagram, and meme strategies to reach young men. Trump also frequently appeared at UFC fights, WWE events, and college football games throughout the election.
For Vice President Kamala Harris to win the election, she needed to rack up huge margins with women voters – and she too attempted to reach this key voting bloc through alternative media. Most notably, Harris did a 40-minute interview on “Call Her Daddy”, which is a widely popular podcast hosted by Alex Cooper and has an estimated 5 million listeners according to POLITICO. Harris also hosted a town hall with Oprah Winfrey, and Harris’ campaign dramatically outspent Trump’s with advertising on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube.
Takeaway
At GSG, we’ve long advised clients that a diverse approach to paid and earned media is critical to reaching key audiences in an increasingly fragmented media consumption environment. This is especially true of younger audiences as Edison Research’s Infinite Dial Report shows that 59% of Americans between the ages of 12 and 34 were listening to podcasts in January 2024.
While President Trump won the election, we believe both campaigns were savvy in how they used alternative media and social media to reach key voting blocs. And perhaps by 2028, a presidential candidate will finally be brave enough to go on Hot Ones.
For public affairs professionals conducting advocacy campaigns in 2025 and targeting the new Congress and its legislative agenda, efforts to reach constituents and policy influencers through alternative media – both paid and earned – should be a part of the strategy toolkit.
Bluesky is Having Another Moment as a Possible Alternative to Elon Musk’s X
The X-like platform has grown to 18 million users
Elon Musk’s involvement in Donald Trump’s campaign, which included a $1 million-a-day giveaway to swing state voters and reports that X’s algorithm may have been tweaked to favor conservative-leaning voices, has led to another exodus of X users who are migrating to rival Bluesky in large numbers.
According to Forbes, Bluesky has added more than 9 million users since September, with the vast majority of them joining the platform in the weeks since the November 6 election. Bluesky’s CEO, Jay Gruber, claims that Bluesky is adding 10,000 users every 10-to-15 minutes.
Takeaway
Bluesky is certainly worth monitoring – especially if you’re a public affairs professional working with a left-of-center organization or individual – as highly-engaged progressive political influencers and news junkies are who seem to be leading the movement to the platform.
However, it’s worth pointing out that Bluesky and other X alternatives, such as Threads (which we’ll discuss more in the next section) have had “moments” before, only to fizzle out. And keep in mind that 18 million users is still extremely small compared to the reach of X – which has an estimated 106 million monthly active users in the United States alone.
Lastly, Bluesky is a long ways away from allowing marketers to reach users through paid advertising, as Gruber told Wired they have no plans to “enshittify the network with ads” any time soon.
Meta’s Threads App Set to Launch Ads in Early 2025
The rival to X hits more than 275 million monthly users
In October, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced that Threads, which is another alternative to X, reached 275 million monthly users during the company’s earnings call according to CNBC. During the earnings call, the company hinted at plans for advertising on Threads but said that the company doesn’t expect Threads to become a “meaningful driver” of revenue in 2025.
Fast forward to mid-November and a report from The Information confirms that advertising is coming to Threads in January 2025 with a small number of advertisers selected to make and publish ads before Meta likely rolls out Threads advertising more broadly.
Takeaway
Threads, which is tightly integrated into Meta’s Instagram and Facebook products, has been growing at a steady clip since it launched nearly a year and a half ago.
The challenge for public affairs professionals, especially those focused on social and political issues, is that Meta representatives have repeatedly said that they will not prioritize political content in the algorithm for either Instagram or Threads, making it more difficult for political-orientated organizations and individuals to grow their followings organically and reach those that do not follow their accounts. This decision explains in part why much of the recent exodus from X has been to BlueSky instead of Threads.
However, the announcement that advertising is coming to Threads means that public affairs professionals and marketers will likely soon be able to reach users across Meta’s full suite of social networking products if they conform to their advertising policies around social and political content.
More from GSG
Earlier this month, GSG welcomed Nicholas Kreider on as our new Executive Vice President of Insights. With over 15 years of research experience, Nick’s wealth of knowledge and proven track record of delivering data-driven insights for clients is a strong addition to the team. Learn more about Nick and his work here.
