The relationship between race competitiveness, standing in the polls, and social media communication strategies during the 2014 U.S. gubernatorial campaigns

Political campaigns have been systematically using social media for strategic advantage. However, little is known about how competitiveness affects the ways candidates communicate online. Our study analyzes how race competitiveness as measured by polling performance influences candidates’ strategies on Twitter and Facebook. We analyze all social media messages of Republican and Democratic candidates in states that held gubernatorial elections in 2014 using supervised automated content analysis. We find that position in the polls and that race competitiveness are correlated with the ways candidates communicate on social media, and that candidates use Twitter and Facebook in different ways to communicate with the public.