Social media and politics: Which party conference generated the most buzz?

Oct 10, 2014 | Social media

With the final party conference season before the UK elections coming to a close, how did the Conservatives, Labour and the Liberal Democrats compare on social media? New data shows that being the most talked about party on Twitter is not always a good thing… The study, from Hotwire reveals social media insights and analytics […]

With the final party conference season before the UK elections coming to a close, how did the Conservatives, Labour and the Liberal Democrats compare on social media? New data shows that being the most talked about party on Twitter is not always a good thing…


The study, from Hotwire reveals social media insights and analytics from the Labour, Lib Dem and Conservative party conferences.
Using its in-house insights and analytics tool, Listening Post, Hotwire monitored the official hashtags, #LDConf, Lab14 and #Con14 for a view of the social buzz around all three events.
The analysis looks at:
• Top ten topics on social media
• Most popular tweets connected to each party hashtag
• Winner of the social media battle
Social media stats and analysis: Labour, Conservative and Lib Dem Party Conferences 2014
Hotwire monitored all social mentions for the party conferences and found that the Conservative party generated the most social buzz.
• #CPC14: 206,483 tweets with this hashtag
• #LAB14: 154,879 tweets with this hashtag
• #LDCONF: 57,532 tweets with this hashtag
However, with the negative tweets proving the most engaging, ‘winning’ the social battle this year could potentially prove bad news for the Tories as the election draws closer. Hotwire monitored to see which tweets saw the most engagement in terms of favourites and retweets. Interestingly, from each of the party conferences, the most popular tweets were negative in tone:
Finally, Hotwire monitored to see which topics discussed at each party conference generated the most chatter around each party conference.
• NHS
o #CPC14 – 9.93% of tweets using this hashtag mentioned the NHS
o #LAB14 – 8.72% of tweets using this hashtag mentioned the NHS
o #LDConf – only 3.56% of tweets using this hashtag mentioned the NHS
• Tax
o CPC14 – 8.44% of tweets using this hashtag mentioned tax
o #LAB14 – 4.68% of tweets using this hashtag mentioned tax
o #LDConf – only 3.68% of tweets using this hashtag mentioned tax
• Economy
o #LAB14 – 1.27% of tweets using this hashtag mentioned tax
o CPC14 – 1.13% of tweets using this hashtag mentioned the economy
o #LDConf – only 0.55% of tweets using this hashtag mentioned tax
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Source: Source: Hotwire/Listening Post.

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