Over the past few months we’ve been tracking what Australians have been saying about election issues online both in traditional and social media.  The tool tracks mentions of nominated keywords and analyses sentiment, share of voice, number of impressions, impact of conversations and media influence.

At an overall level, share of voice has been substantially in Labor’s favour throughout the course of the election campaign to date.

 

Similarly, Gillard has commanded a greater share of voice overall than has Abbott, however in recent weeks share of voice for the leaders has narrowed considerably.

In analysing the share of voice commanded at both the party and political leader level, the impact of specific campaign events upon share of voice can be seen. The most recent instance of such an occurrence is the spike in share of voice experienced by Labor and Gillard on Monday 16^th of August, corresponding with the official launch date of the ALP campaign.

The type of sentiment being expressed for each of the two leaders has been relatively equal throughout the past month, with the ratios of positive versus negative sentiment being consistent at both the individual and comparative level. This finding reflects the tightly contested nature of the election as it enters into the final stages of the campaign and is consistent with the mood of the nation as reflected in the various opinion polls, all of which are predicting that the election outcome will be close with no clear favourite emerging.

With regard to traditional media versus social media, each leader is attracting a higher proportion of favorable sentiment among traditional media sources than they are among social media sources. However this is not to suggest that the sentiment being expressed within social media is more likely to be negative in nature, rather it illustrates that within social media there is a higher level of commentary that is more neutral in tone.

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