Social media is becoming more and more important in election campaigns, although only a very small percentage of the electorate actually reads, watches or hears what their political frontmen and frontwomen have to say on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube or their blogs.

With only a few days to go before Wednesday’s local elections in the Netherlands, Dutch politicians are putting in their final efforts to win the support of their prospective voters. In the old days, local candidates simply handed out flyers while canvassing in the streets of their municipality, but these days, modern social media has taken the place of the old-fashioned flyer or placard.
 

Succesful
If you want to be a successful politician, you should at least have a Twitter account, a Facebook page, a Flickr photostream or a YouTube video page. The occasional posting on a website or a blog simply won’t do anymore — or so it seems.
 

Only a handful
According to a report by Dutch research bureau Berenschot, almost half of the Dutch local parties are using Twitter, YouTube, Hyves (the Dutch equivalent of Facebook) and LinkedIn for this year’s  campaign. But only a handful of voters are actually following them. Berenschot says only four percent of the voters regularly read or watch tweets, videos, blogs or a picture posted on Flickr.

The average local political party only has two to five Twitter or Hyves followers out of every 10,000 inhabitants of the municipality they represent.
 

'Talk to them'
So if these figures are so low, do local politicians actually benefit from their social media efforts? Marc Hesp, a local councillor for the conservative VVD party in the north of the Netherlands, says most politicians don't get it: “We don’t call it social media for nothing”, he says. “It means you have to interact with your readers and listeners. Simply telling them who to vote for is not enough. You have to talk with them, listen to them”.

Mr Hesp should know, as he is nominated for the “Best Local Web Politician of the Year” award, which will be announced on Monday. He currently has 55 fans on Facebook, 628 followers on Twitter and a blog which he updates almost daily.

But sometimes politicians simply get it all wrong.
 

Campaign song
The PvdA (Labour) party in Kampen, for instance, produced a YouTube clip in which they made an attempt to sing an uplifting campaign song. The local party quickly withdrew the video once popular Dutch guerrilla-style blog GeenStijl mocked the video. You can still see the video on the GeenStijl-website.

Another local politician who displayed her singing talents – or lack thereof - in a YouTube video is VVD (Conservative) candidate Sabine Koebrugge from the northern city of Groningen. In the video, she raps her way through political topics like student housing and the local economy:

The VVD in Enschede chose a different approach to get their message across – by using a model and the age old message that sex sells. Well, the video doesn't contain any sex, but watch out for the model taking off her winter coat. Click here to watch their video.

In the nude
Local party Student058 from Leeuwarden went a little bit further and put up election posters displaying their leader Michel Hania in the nude, with only a glass of beer hiding his private parts. "Our slogan is 'Nothing more, nothing less'", Mr Hania said. "And this is what we are, this is what you get. Back to the basics of life and politics". You can see the poster here.