UK Labour Leadership election: the online campaign

Karl -

Following a poor electoral result for the UK Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, its leader, announced his intention to resign from the position, which triggered a leadership election. There are currently 3 contestants running for leader of the Labour Party; Rebecca Long-Bailey, Lisa Nandy, and Keir Starmer. However, when the readings where taken, the leadership race included Emily Thornberry, who was eliminated from the race after failing to secure enough nominations. I still included her online following as registered on 11th February 2020 and refer to her as a candidate in this post.

I thought it would be interesting to visually compare the online following of the candidates up to that day and highlight their use of ads across different platforms. Would love to compare the difference in the number of followers and likes in a few weeks or once the race is over, and then write an analysis on it, based on the result.

Readings were taken from the Twitter, Instagram and Facebook pages of the candidates on 11th February 2020 and numbers were rounded to the nearest hundred. The readings on the number of ads were taken from the Facebook Ads Library which tracks political ads on Instagram and Facebook. Twitter forbids political advertisements on its platform.

Rebecca Long-Bailey announced her candidacy for leadership of the Labour Party on 6 January 2020.

Website: rebeccaforleader.org

  • Ads on Instagram or Facebook from the date of the announcement until 11th February 2020: 25 ads

Lisa Nandy announced her candidacy for leadership of the Labour Party on 3 January 2020.

Website: lisanandy.org

  • Ads on Instagram or Facebook from the date of the announcement until 11th February 2020: 6 ads

Keir Starmer announced his candidacy for leadership of the Labour Party on 4 January 2020.

Website: keirstarmer.com

  • Ads on Instagram or Facebook from the date of the announcement until 11th February 2020: 31 ads

Emily Thornberry announced her candidacy for leadership of the Labour Party on 18 December 2019.

Website: emilyforlabour.com

  • Ads on Instagram or Facebook from the date of the announcement: 229 ads