“Not only will residents be able to be notified of upcoming City Council, Planning, and Zoning Board meetings, but they will also be able to find out about cultural events, recreational activities, and public emergencies,” the city says in an announcement.

While the city’s Twitter account was created in early August, it ramped up the frequency in the days before today’s official announcement. After just one tweet each day on August 2, 5 and 10, the city has tweeted eight times in the last three days.

A month before the BOE election in April, the Fulop team asked 100 volunteers to enter the names of ten people likely to vote for their candidates into a mobile database system called Campaign Connect. The system allowed them to add email addresses and link potential voters with specific issues of interest. Forty volunteers added 1,000 leads that month, and the campaign later sent email reminders to the volunteers asking them to remind those people to vote.

“We wanted to make them accountable for a certain action,” says Candice Osborne, partner and CEO of C&S Strategies, which built the Campaign Connect system. The digital technology and consulting firm is located on Morris Street in Paulus Hook.

Fifty-six percent of those volunteer-provided voters came out to vote, as determined through voter records, according to Kara Silverman, Fulop’s media director.

To assist in the get-out-the-vote process, Osborne says, observers kept track of who voted via mobile devices or laptops, automatically updating the campaign database so volunteers knew not to bother contacting people who already voted.

The system allows Fulop’s team to take information gleaned from petition drives, events, and other interactions with voters, and attach it to more basic, publicly available voter file data. Osborne considered enhancing the voter file with purchased marketing data — usually information estimating household income or demographics — but in the end she deemed it mostly “junk.” It’s part of the reason she and the Fulop team wanted to develop a tool to better collect and organize real information about real Jersey City voters.

“We want to go on our own, using volunteers and petitions,” Osborne says. “We’re getting better data there.”

Initially, her firm developed the system to assist Fulop himself, as he needed a way to add information learned when speaking with potential supporters to a readily accessible database. “He is very good at talking to people, but he missed opportunities to store information,” says Osborne.

The use of sophisticated digital tools for political organizing has become more prevalent for presidential and congressional candidates since Barack Obama’s 2008 campaign popularized it. However, that modern approach hasn’t yet trickled down to local election operations in many cases. (See our recap of 2009′s mayoral candidates use of the web here.)

In addition to the mobile voting day effort, the Fulop team also bought online advertising before the election. (JCI readers may have spotted image ads featuring the three school board candidates, as well as for their rivals.) Like organizing through digital tools, online advertising is a common practice in national and statewide races that remains somewhat rare in smaller municipal races.

Facebook has also become a platform for advocacy around local political issues, so it should come as no surprise that political candidates and groups have embraced the popular social networking site. Advocacy groups and candidates — from President Barack Obama to Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer — have asked supporters to “donate” their Facebook profile pictures or status updates. The idea is to use supporters, and potentially their extensive networks of Facebook friends to spread a campaign message or simply remind friends to vote. Fulop’s people asked supporters to “tag” friends to a vote-reminder graphic on Facebook (seen at right) the Monday before the Wednesday BOE election.

“We just bombarded social media [telling them], ‘These are the people you’re supposed to vote for,’” Osborne says. While we saw several users complain of being spammed by the tagging, if it successfully reminded users that an election was happening — which seems likely — it could be considered a success.

Only around 370 people like Fulop on Facebook, and Osborne says she is working to grow that number (Fulop’s personal Facebook profile features much more interaction and public comment than his Public Figure page). He also has around 880 followers on Twitter. Meanwhile, Mayor Jerramiah Healy does not appear to have an active official Facebook or Twitter account, just a ghost account from 2009′s campaign on Twitter, and a personal profile and neglected public page on Facebook. Meanwhile, other political groups, like Dan Levin’s One Jersey City, maintain a presence on each platform even when there’s no election; One Jersey City’s Facebook group has 319 members, and it is followed by 191 users on Twitter.

Fulop plans to bolster his online video efforts, too, says Osborne, noting that he’ll respond to questions from voters via videos posted on Facebook. The trend toward incorporating video both for campaigning and to update constituents is becoming more popular, particularly as people view more and more video on their mobile devices.

Could mobile organizing technology and digital channels like Facebook help Fulop in the 2013 race? If anything, Fulop could stand to benefit from harnessing activities already taking place in digital channels, especially if Healy and others ignore them. By constantly cultivating these areas years before the actual election, Fulop is poised to be far ahead of candidates who jump in the race and then build the digital infrastructure.

Photo of Fulop and BOE candidates Carol Harrison-Arnold, Sue Mack and Marvin Adames on election night by Steve Gold

The story received international attention; Alaina and her family were thrust into the spotlight and interviewed by Gayle King, Today, Inside Edition and scores of print publications. At press time, Alaina’s attorneys have successfully appealed the judge’s ruling temporarily. But the curious backstory of how she went from obscurity to international headlines starts right here in Jersey City with Peter Kaufmann (seen at right).

The longtime Jersey City resident, veteran rock-n-roll drummer, teacher, writer and president of a homespun self-help program aptly named Rockin’ Lifestyle, Kaufmann also happened to be a childhood friend of Alaina Giordano and he helped bring worldwide attention to her cause.

We caught up with him to discuss his unexpected role in not only rooting for the underdog, but in trouncing the bullies with the might of social media.

How did this all start?

I’ve known Alaina since we were in 1st grade, and she was always really sweet and a good friend. She moved away before high school, but like everyone else in the world, we were reconnected through Facebook, a few years back.

So, she obviously told you she was battling breast cancer, right?

Yeah, she was pretty private about it, in terms of not broadcasting via Facebook, but when I was dealing with my fiancee’s breast cancer we talked a lot about coping with cancer.

Your fiancee was diagnosed with stage three breast cancer in late 2009. Did this give you additional empathy towards Alaina’s plight?

Definitely. Not just my fiancee — my sister also had battled breast cancer. But when Alaina told me that she was going to court to fight for custody I didn’t worry too much about it. I never dreamed that a judge would rule against a mom with cancer. I mean, Alaina isn’t debilitated by cancer — it’s controlled and not spreading — so life, as far as her kids know it, is not about having a “sick mother.”

Still, the judge was quoted as saying that it was more important for the children to spend time with their “non-ill parent.”

Exactly – despite the fact that the father had been largely absent in the kids’ day-to-day life and was moving halfway across the country.

When Alaina broke the news about losing custody did you think you could possibly help her?

At first I was just in shock. She told me what had transpired in court the previous day and I was floored. Speechless. And it takes a lot for me to be speechless. Then I got really angry. I felt kind of like this evil group of bullies beat up my schoolyard pal when no one was around to protect her. I could not imagine lying down and taking that verdict without some kind of fight. So I did what any social-media savvy person would do: I made a fan page on Facebook.

You are pretty savvy because your livelihood depends on it, right?

Yes. I was forced to learn about social media in order for my career to survive. As a musician or anyone in the entertainment industry, without a presence in social media, you’re pretty much nonexistent. So it was easy for me to create a fan page with the title: Alaina Giordano Should Not Lose Her Kids Because She Has Breast Cancer. I believe that if you have the ability to help someone — whether it be through your skills, knowledge, or talent — and you don’t, you’re guilty of what happens to them.

And what happened? Did you expect it to take off like it did? Did Alaina approve your going public with her story?

Yes, Alaina was fine with me creating this page. I told her that it would catch like wildfire and we’d definitely get some press. Through media coverage my goal was to find some pro bono representation so that she could appeal the court’s ruling.

Wow – and that’s precisely what happened. Tell me, what do you think makes a story like this catch the public’s attention?

Well, everyone has been touched by cancer in some way, shape or form. Everyone. Add to that single parents, divorced parents, custody survivors, cancer survivors, plus your general concerned citizen who can’t stand to see injustice carried out – especially because Alaina was so “out-lawyered” by her ex’s expensive team of attorneys. I knew how powerful Facebook was. C’mon, it has something like 500 million users; you only need a fraction of those to get your message heard worldwide. I just promoted the hell out of her cause — starting with our closest friends and our mutual childhood friends as our solid base. I sent messages to people and asked everyone to repost and “share” the link. Of course, people starting sharing right away. You could see the dots multiplying with each passing day: 200 “likes,” then 400, 800, 1,200, then over 20,000. At the same time Alaina’s sister Lauren, started a petition that garnered over 100,000 signatures [to present to North Carolina’s governor expressing public outrage] – and Sara, another one of Alaina’s friends, started a donation fund to cover any expenses that might strain Alaina’s budget.

That’s really helpful; did you come up with a fundraising idea too?

Yes, there’s also a song coming out for Alaina entitled “I Believe,” written and performed by New Jersey hip-hop Artists Venn Grimm and Arioose. They’ve been gracious enough to donate their services with all the proceeds of the song going to Alaina and her children. I think the song reflects exactly how the public feels about this battle Alaina is going through. Not only is music a great way to send a message to the world, but in this case it can help Alaina out financially as well.

That’s great news, plus Alaina is a stay-at-home mom, isn’t she?

Yes, which the court sees as: “she doesn’t work.”

That’s so infuriating. Every mother knows that a stay-at-home mom’s job is 24/7 … exhausting, yet rewarding. So, the court’s idea was basically ‘you want to be with your kids – move to Chicago and live closer to their dad.’

Right, either move there or stay in North Carolina, continue your treatment and they’ll visit you from time to time. Gimme a damn break! But you know, I watched my fiancee go through cancer treatment and recovery. Believe me, the last thing you want to do is move, or undergo something as stressful as a custody battle or losing your kids to your ex. The lack of empathy made me so mad. Plus, Alaina and I are both from New Jersey, and in New Jersey we don’t play that.

What does that mean?

It means we don’t go down without a fight. A lot of people like to joke around about New Jersey, but remember — you piss us off and you will regret having done so. People from New Jersey are loyal to each other, even if you move out of state. I’ll fight to the death on an issue I truly believe in. And if I die trying, I’ll come back and haunt you as a poltergeist. Believe that.

Is this a Rockin’ Lifestyle philosophy?

[laughs] Yeah, it kind of is. I talk a lot about following your passion – about inspiring yourself and others to do positive things, and to quit complaining. When something doesn’t sit right – like a hapless judge making a life-altering decision that will impact two vulnerable children – you better believe you gotta fight the fight, for all it’s worth.

As things stand now Alaina has her children as a temporary measure pending another ruling, correct?

Yes. Obviously the goal is to get the ruling overturned so she’ll never have to worry about her kids being ordered to leave their home and their mother. The larger goal though is to change some of the legislation that judges still rule by — about kids living with the “non-ill parent” — and redefining what “sick parent” truly means. Alaina may have cancer, but she’s a stable, functioning and very loving mom. Her kids need her now, more than ever.

The rules are pretty simple: to be eligible, you just have to “like” Magnets.com on the company’s Facebook page and leave a comment saying you want to participate in the contest. You can double your chances of winning by following the company on Twitter and then Tweeting your interest in participating in the contest.

The winner will be chosen in a random drawing scheduled for Tuesday, May 10. (For full contest rules and details, click here.)

“This contest helps introduce us and our story to people who may not be very familiar with our brand and quality products,” Magnets.com president Erwin Metius says. “We’d certainly like to wish each contestant the best of luck, and we look forward to announcing one lucky winner next month.”

As we know from past experience, there’s nothing the folks over at Men’s Health love more than a good list. This month, the magazine has a new one out that measures the most socially networked cities in America, and Jersey City comes in at number 43 on the list, sandwiched between Des Moines and Indianapolis.

While there are likely a number of ways to measure social connectivity online, the Men’s Health methodology seems pretty legit. They explain it here:

We started by calculating the number of Facebook and LinkedIn users per capita, followed by overall Twitter usage (NetProspex). Then we looked at traffic generated by the major social networks, including Myspace, Friendster, Reddit, and Digg (analyzed by ad network Chitika). Finally, after factoring in the percentage of households that check out chat rooms and blogs (SimplyMap), we had the results.

Much like in this year’s Census count, Jersey City fell behind perennial rival Newark on this list (the Brick City came in at 35), but we did come in ten spots ahead of our big brother across the river, New York City.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering, the top five cities on list were, in order: D.C., Atlanta, Denver, Minneapolis and Seattle. For the rest of the results, you can check out the full list here.

Last night, Jersey City Incinerator Authority (JCIA) crews cleared a number of emergency snow routes from “curb to curb.” Meanwhile, the JCPD and Office of Emergency Management worked on removing the approximately 50 remaining abandoned cars off of city streets, according to city officials, who say the workers tried at all costs to avoid towing the abandoned vehicles, instead visiting the homes of the car’s registered owners when possible.

The cleanup continues today, as about 20 JCIA crews work to clear the remaining emergency routes, as well as any streets that have yet to be plowed. They are also working to clear the corners of snow, and have been assisted by Department of Public Works (DPW) employees in doing so.

The city is once again warning residents not to shovel snow into the streets; doing so is a violation of city law and makes the citywide plowing operation slower and more costly. City inspectors will be enforcing this law, as well as the law forcing residents and businesses to clear their sidewalks enough to allow pedestrians and strollers to easily pass. Under the law, businesses must do this within four hours of sunrise after a storm (residents have eight hours after sunrise), but the city had given a few days grace since the storm was so severe and fell on a holiday weekend.

The city’s continued cleanup efforts come as some frustrated residents are voicing their concerns on this website, on Twitter (check out four recent examples here, here, here and here) and on the city’s Facebook page about unplowed streets, a lack of garbage pickup and a lack of leadership from the Healy administration. Many critics have taken the opportunity to compare Mayor Healy’s response to that of Newark Mayor Cory Booker, who has been all over Twitter — and all over Newark — responding directly to residents’ concerns.

Booker’s work has once again put his savvy use of Twitter in the national spotlight, with TIME calling him “the Superhero of the Blizzard.” Healy’s Twitter account has not been updated since he won re-election in May 2009 (though a “Not Mayor Healy” spoof account did surface this week after the blizzard hit).

We’re currently awaiting a response to the criticisms from city officials; we’ll update the story when we receive one.

- Hudson Has High Twitter Density: A new study from Jaffe Communications says that Hudson County has the highest concentration of Twitter users in the state.

- Cops Still Looking for Driver in Hit-and-Run: The JCPD continues to investigate the identity of the driver of a vehicle that killed a 72-year-old woman in a hit-and-run collision on Saturday; detectives are seeking the public’s help.

- Cop Faces Jail Time: A 29-year-old Jersey City cop faces up to 10 years in prison and the loss of his job when he’s sentenced Friday for assaulting his wife in December 2008 after he found her in a parked car with a man in Bayonne.

- Sentencing and Guilty Pleas in Rx Pills Ring: A 36-year-old Jersey City man was sentenced to state prison last week for distributing Percocet pills and heroin last year. Meanwhile, two other defendants from Jersey City pleaded guilty for their respective roles in the operation.

- City to Dedicate Trees Today: Jersey City will dedicate several trees planted last fall along 7th Street near Brunswick this morning at 10 am. “Working with residents and organizations in beautifying their neighborhood gives them the opportunity to take ownership of their local environment which they can be proud of,” Mayor Healy says in a statement. “At the same time, it builds a stronger community by developing and nurturing relationships among neighbors and city officials.”

- New Hire at Westin Newport: Donna Rybak has joined the Westin Jersey City Newport as its new catering sales manager; she was previously at the Westin Princeton at Forrestal Village down in Princeton.

- Arson Charges for 17-Year-Old: Investigators have arrested a Snyder High School sophomore on charges he set fire to a roll of paper towels in a bathroom at the school last week; the fire caused an evacuation.

Today’s Best Bets:

- The Tuesday two-fer is on, with free live music at Bar Majestic (Greg Ribot at 8 pm) and at Lucky 7′s (David Rynhart and Billy from WJ & the Sweet Sacrifice at 9 pm). Meanwhile, there’s also live music (from Roland Ramos) at what may be one of the final few BabyHole comedy show/open mics hosted by Melissa Surach; this week’s installment features comedy from Matt Ruby and Mike Lawrence and plenty of opportunities to get up on stage and do your thing (9 pm at the Lamp Post).

In Statewide News:

- Mass Student Walkout Slated for Today: Thousands of New Jersey high school students are expected to walk out of classes today to protest education cuts proposed by Gov. Christie. According to the Facebook group through which the protest was organized, more than 16,000 students plan to leave school between 8 am and 4 pm.

- NJ Pastor Leads Fight Against Arizona Immigration Law: A national Latino clergy group headed by Bergen County’s Rev. Miguel Rivera intends to file a federal court petition today in Phoenix challenging the constitutionality of Arizona’s controversial new immigration law. “Every Latino in Arizona will be in harm’s way with this law,” he tells the Record. “This is a law that sanctions, essentially, racial profiling. Police officers will work on the assumption that every brown person is an undocumented immigrant.”

- Offshore Drilling Hearing Today: New Jerseyans are getting their first opportunity to comment on the Obama administration’s plan to allow oil and gas exploration in the Atlantic Ocean with a hearing today in Newark.

- Court Rules NJ Blogger Not Protected by Shield Law: An appellate court has ruled that a blogger sued for defamation is not a journalist and is not covered by New Jersey’s shield law.

- Her Task: Making NJ More Business-Friendly: Lieutenant governor Kim Guadagno’s main charge in the Christie administration thus far has been leading the governor’s effort to jump-start economic development; the Record checks in with her to see how it’s going.

- Mechanical Car Inspections on the Chopping Block: New Jersey drivers would no longer be required to have their vehicles inspected every two years under a proposal by the Motor Vehicle Commission that could save the state $12 million. In addition, drivers whose vehicles are five years or younger would be exempt from emissions testing under the new plan. The current exemption is for vehicles four years old or younger. The MVC says the fail rate of the test isn’t enough to justify its cost, and points out that 29 states don’t have inspections.

- DOT Chief Says Safety Won’t Be Impacted by Slimmer Budget: The state Department of Transportation’s proposed fiscal year 2011 budget will be about 4 percent smaller, but while some road improvements could be delayed, safety and maintenance projects will not be put on hold, according to Transportation Commissioner Jim Simpson.

- Early Results: Low Pass Rates on Alternate Grad Exams: A year after the state revamped its alternate high school graduation exam, just 10 percent of the students who took the language arts portion earlier this year passed, while 34 percent passed the math section, according to preliminary results from the state Department of Education. State officials say the results are incomplete and caution against reading too much into them.

- Not Many Apps for Flood Aid Yet: Only a fraction of eligible business and property owners affected by severe early spring flooding in New Jersey have applied for available assistance.

But Jersey City is changing in many ways, as the Technological Society becomes more fully realized each and every day. So it’s only fitting that in this year’s campaign, we were treated to a high-tech version of the notorious sound truck: the truck for incumbent Mayor Jerramiah Healy blasting video advertisements (many featuring President Barack Obama). Yes, indeed, the nature of politicking in Chilltown is changing.

Meanwhile on the web, the past five years have birthed an interactive multiverse of social networking, content management, bleeding edge hardware, mobile web applications and the disappearing barriers between content creators, distributors and consumers. The difference is staggering. It has changed the face of everything it has touched, including politics, and those who ignore it face a major disadvantage when facing those who embrace it.

We saw just how far this new web can affect the outcome of an election during Barack Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign. The Obama campaign did what no one had done before: it embraced new technologies as a fundamental and integrated component of traditional campaign organizing and fundraising, rather than a sideshow. Technology was not just a tool in their toolbox, it was their drive train.

MyBarackObama.com allowed local organizers to plug in with the national campaign, taking the reigns on grassroots organizing while staying connected and relevant to the overall strategy. It also offered a suite of tools that allowed organizers to easily send out email blasts or coordinate with others. Twitter social messaging was used to get information out to people, but it was also used to focus organizers and engage supporters in an energizing and interactive way. Facebook groups were used to cement the youth vote in a way that had rarely been seen before. And now, this is the standard by which other campaigns are being judged.

Well, I might not go that far. The Obama campaign had one thing most campaigns only dream of having: Barack Obama. But lessons from the campaign could be learned by any candidate for any office.

So how did Jersey City’s mayoral and City Council candidates use these lessons and emerging web campaign technologies to bolster their bids for office this spring? With the hangover from the elections receding into the background and the runoff passed, we take a look at how well the campaigns integrated new technologies into their own strategies, and what impact that had on the outcome.

Team Healy

The website for incumbent Mayor Healy and his roster of City Council candidates was fairly simple and informative, with links to news, biographies, platforms and positions. The site’s page loading was slowed down by objects and images, but the content was easy to navigate.

The Team Healy site was also tied to the social web, with outgoing links to Facebook and YouTube pages.

The Healy campaign boasted two Facebook pages in addition to individual candidate’s pages. Healy For Mayor 2009 was the most active. A political organization page with 236 members, it dwarfed the nascent Young Professionals for Mayor Healy, another political organization page with only 27 members.

One Healy candidate, Ward C’s Nidia Rivera Lopez, had her Facebook page notably hacked in late April. Links to pornography were sent out to her 44 Facebook supporters. The fact that her account was compromised and porn sent out over it — during a campaign — is real slacking on her tech team’s part. What was the password on it, 1-2-3-4? (Remind me to change the password on my luggage.)

The Healy team had 13 videos on YouTube, including each campaign ad. They also put longer videos of high-profile Healy endorsements from Newark mayor Cory Booker and Sen. Bob Menendez on the page, as well as several clips used to bolster the messaging of Healy’s ties to Obama. The page is rounded out by clips from Healy’s most recent State of the City address and from the Sustainable Cities conference that took place at Liberty Science Center in March. Of course, the campaign was also shadowed on YouTube by the user “JerryHealy09” which posted a parody ad that apes a Hillary Clinton ad from the Democratic presidential primaries and plays on Healy’s reputation as one with a wee bit of a thirst.

The Healy campaign was one of only two that waded into the Twitter waters this election. Both Healy and Lopez had Twitter accounts, but judging from the number and dates of their updates, it was little more than a passing fad.

@MayorHealy, with only five updates over its apparent lifespan of ten days (May 6-16), still amassed 67 followers; while @NidiaRLopez sent out 13 updates (the last one on election night) and picked up 24 followers. Her use of Twitter seemed more organic than Healy’s, but only slightly (mainly because of this May 7 tweet: “Doing an oral hygiene presentation at the Grandview Senior Center.”). Overall, both accounts feel a bit cold and spammy.

Both Healy and Lopez seem not to have learned one of the basic tenets of Twitter marketing, whether political or not: If you follow people, they will be more likely to follow you back. Healy was only following eight other Twitter users, while Lopez was following six.

Manzo for Jersey City

The website for Lou Manzo and his team of council candidates had a solid amount of information, but it was hampered in load time by too many images and embedded videos all on the home page. It also featured a strange site architecture that tells us it most likely wasn’t set up by a web expert.

The Manzo campaign had videos, but used the relatively obscure service Blip.tv rather than YouTube or Vimeo. The campaign’s Blip page featured several Manzo ads and longer-form segments where he spoke about issues. Manzo’s campaign was largely absent from Facebook and Twitter, even though Manzo did maintain a personal Facebook page, which he used for campaign messaging on occasion.

Smith Team for Positive Change

In the beginning stages of the campaign, the slate headed by Assemblyman L. Harvey Smith had a remedial website that was tough to navigate and sported poorly cropped headshots of Smith’s council candidates.

Smith’s web strategy didn’t really get going until its relatively late-in-the-game hiring of longtime local journalist David Cruz as communications director. One of Cruz’s first tasks was to set up a new website.

The site Cruz went with — which unfortunately can no longer be retrieved online — felt more like a blog than a traditional campaign site, with each candidate “contributing” entries and first-person accounts of life on the trail. The site also included the relevant links to biographical, policy and background information. It also included a schedule of upcoming events, debates and campaign appearances.

One of the Smith team’s other web strengths was the use of YouTube video, both on the YouTube site and embedded in the Smith site. This is not surprising considering Cruz’s recent experience in radio. He took the skills honed at Newark’s WBGO and turned them into campaign videos that, while not slick by any means, were effective in other ways.

The two campaign ads were obvious candidates for the YouTube page. But the nine longer clips, of candidates out campaigning and sometimes talking off the cuff about various issues, were the real diamond in the rough here. They were entertaining (at least to a political wonk!), touched on policy (always a plus) and revealed more about the real person behind the candidate than any campaign ad did this season.

One Jersey City

For a campaign with very little money, the One Jersey City team, led by mayoral candidate Dan Levin, made good use of the web and social media.

The campaign’s main site featured a traditional layout, but at times was hard to navigate and was slow to load. The site also suffered from a few false starts.

In the nascent stages of the campaign, the One Jersey City team was using its site to illustrate one of its main campaign themes: using programs and policies that have worked in other places to help solve the problems facing Jersey City. To that end, the site briefly began uploading policy papers, research and related news articles about issues like community policing. It was a strategy that merged well with the web, with its endless interconnectivity and borderless geography. But unfortunately as the campaign heated up, the campaign (understandably) had little time to do such rudimentary blogging.

A similar phenomenon took place with the campaign’s use of short web videos designed to illustrate a problem in the city and the solution that the campaign was offering. Billed as a series, the last video was teased on the blog in February, and they ended up only touching on land use and zoning issues — important issues, no doubt, but not exactly the “hot” issues in the campaign.

On Facebook, One Jersey City was disproportionately well-represented, when compared to the overall vote total it received. Its One Jersey City common interest group sports 222 members, with a more active “Wall” than most of the other campaigns and a variety of on-the-scenes photos and messages from Levin. The group is still active as of this writing, which is fitting since Levin has said the campaign was only the beginning for One Jersey City.

For a low-budget grassroots campaign, One Jersey City was lookin’ good on video, thanks to help from Jersey City’s own Colin Comstock of Le Arsenal AV. The campaign was the only one to go with Vimeo in addition to YouTube, and they’ve got 15 videos on their Vimeo page, including the one campaign ad they produced, those short issues videos we mentioned above and solid footage from campaign events and from public hearings where Levin spoke.

Phil Webb

The website of mayoral candidate Phil Webb was by far the least technologically advanced, and also hardly included any relevant information about the candidate. Webb’s site was an out of the box solution from CompleteCampaigns.com, and while it is not a bad idea to go with such a product (especially if money is an issue, as it was for Webb), if you do, you should modify it to make sure — at the very least — that the majority of links aren’t empty pages.

Webb did do some ingenious advertising on Craigslist, as proven by the ad that read: “MAY 12, 2009 IS THE ELECTION. PLEASE GO TO YOU TUBE.COM AND TYPE IN PHIL WEBB NET, TO VIEW HIS COMMERCIAL…. THANK YOU AND PLEASE PASS THE WORD…”

Doing so takes you to Phil Webb’s YouTube presence, which is poorly branded (the video is actually part of Champagne Films’ page, not a dedicated Webb page) — but at least he got something up there.

Steven Fulop

Independent Ward E candidate Steven Fulop’s web strategy rivaled Team Healy’s for its sophistication and bested all the other campaigns for its use of emerging web tools and technologies (perhaps no surprise since the councilman is an avid iPhone user).

His main site was contemporary in design, with a Flash banner headline and various multimedia elements prominently displayed. The navigation was clear, the content was easy to find and the site loaded relatively quickly.

The Fulop campaign was the clear leader on Facebook, with three different pages, in addition to his personal page.

The largest page was the Councilman Steven Fulop common interest group, which as of this writing boasts 449 members and an active “Wall.” The older Steven Fulop 2009 common interest group has 36 members, while the related Fulop Commitment profile page has 45 friends.

Despite placing no traditional video advertising on local cable, the Fulop campaign did produce web videos and hosted them on their YouTube page. Most of them feature Fulop speaking on issues at events, with the exception of the one post-election video — a slick “thank you” video shot on election night.

The Fulop campaign was the only one besides the Healy campaign to use Twitter, and was a very active tweeter during the campaign. He’s since discontinued one of the Twitter accounts and now lives @StevenFulop. His Twitter page, which he still updates, is worth following for random bits of insight into City Council and Council Caucus meetings (June 1, 6:16 pm: “Gaughan is mad…. Vega not so much”).

From Bits to Ballots

If there is one thing that cannot be stressed enough, it is that the best new media strategy will never change a fundamental fact of politics: if you can’t get out the vote, you won’t win the election. This year’s elections were determined by about 20 percent of the city’s registered voters, and the votes broke overwhelmingly for Mayor Healy’s slate in every ward, with the exception of Fulop’s runaway win in Ward E.

Only part of this can be ascribed to voter apathy. Getting out the vote was essential to Healy’s opponents, but the votes never materialized. While traditional get out the vote efforts often require massive investment in campaign organization, funds which Healy’s opponents simply did not have, they can be overcome by an influx of motivated, coordinated volunteers.

One of the major benefits of new media is the relatively low cost of entry to a campaign. All the tools available are free, like most of the web, requiring only an investment of talent and careful planning. With said talent and planning, new media can be a great leveling device, especially in local elections, helping to mitigate organizational or fundraising difficulties. But while this year’s election was well ahead of the last election with regard to use of new media and social networks, it was still light years behind the kind of integrated use present in many innovative national campaigns, and far below their potential. This is part of what kept the big-fundraising incumbents in office.

TIPS FOR SUCCESS

• Focus on search engine optimization for your sites, to improve search results for your content.
• Manage social networks effectively, interactively and in relation to on-the-ground organizing.
• Empower and involve your supporters in online communities so that they not only vote themselves, but encourage friends to vote as well on election day (bring a friend to the polls).
• Optimize and maximize online fundraising, stressing easy-to-give small, recurring donations in a secure online environment that is one click away.
• Let your supporters carry your message themselves, through their own projects. Make these satellite projects accessible and give people access to online tools that will help them do this.
• Engage the mobile web via Twitter and SMS text messaging.
• Get your organizers connected. Get them smartphones. Get them workshops.
• However: Realize there is no such thing as a social media expert.

Additional reporting by Jon Whiten.