“When I dance I look a bit like a drunk bear”: the phrase is by Carlo Calenda, and it is the phrase that the leader of Action chose to debut on TikTok. Perhaps proving that he does not know so much about the social network of the moment.
Where certainly there are still the funny sounds, the viral songs and the ballets, but where the panorama is much more varied compared to a couple of years ago. And where the electoral campaign for the September 25 vote obviously went. And it came not only through the mediation of those who were already on the platform, but also through the landing, in the first person, of many leaders politicians.
Waiting for Silvio Berlusconi, who had announced his arrival for Monday and of which there are dozens of fake profiles, the last one was Calenda, but the leader of the 5 Star Movement, Giuseppe Conte, that of the Lega, Matteo Salvini, and that of Fratelli have also been present for some time now of Italy, Giorgia Meloni. Great absent, at the time of writing, both Enrico Letta and the Democratic Party is Matteo Renzi, as we told you some time ago.
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by Emanuele Capone
Why are Italian politicians landing on TikTok?
In short: TikTok seems to be the trending space of this election. The one that may not move who knows how many votes, but that must be guarded in some way. A circumstance that is not surprising, given the unstoppable growth of the social network in the last two years: in May 2022 about 16 million Italians entered TikTok76% more than in 2021. Furthermore, the SensorTower global data show that those who enter the platform stay for a long time: on average, 95 minutes a day.
Numbers that explain the interest of political leaders in the social network byteDance. Which has no longer been a space for ballets and lyp-sincing for a while, despite the idea that Calenda staff seems to have: it is a platform that, thanks also to the potential offered by the algorithm, gives space to every niche of interest . There are content dedicated to books, with l’hashtag #BookTokItalia which has exceeded one billion views and, in general, videos that explain the most disparate topics, collected below the keyword #LearnWithTikTokwhich has more than 26 billion views.
Italian political leaders and TikTok
On the one hand, there are the numbers and people who inhabit this digital space. On the other, the maturation of a platform that seems increasingly suitable for hosting content on the most disparate issues, including politics and the electoral campaign.
A significant example is that of last Colombian electionsin which the entrepreneur and former mayor Rodolfo Hernandez reached, in an unexpected way, the ballot with the current president, Gustavo Petro, also thanks to the performances and numbers on the ByteDance platform.
And this explains the reason so TikTok is a space that political leaders seem not to want to give up. But between staying there and knowing how to stay there is a big difference: for this reason, we have analyzed the profiles of the main political exponents on TikTok to understand the quality of their presence on the social network. Important: the assessments given here do not concern the political aspects, the goodness or the feasibility of the electoral promises, but precisely the ability of party leaders to stay on TikTok. Whether they know how to dance or not.
Carlo Calenda, 13 thousand followers (vote: 6)
The leader of Action debuted on TikTok on August 27, precisely with the video in which he explains that “I don’t know how to dance”. On that same day you published a burst of 6 videos, which is a bit good and a bit not: okay because it is true (as they will have explained) that the algorithm must be nurtured and that it is important to publish a lot, especially at the beginning; not good why what is needed is also constancy, and it doesn’t make much sense to share 6 clips in one day and then another 6 in the next 3 days. It would have been more effective to distribute them better.
Much the choice to reply to comments is appreciable of people: build loyalty, create engagement and also is a move appreciated by TikTok, which tends to reward video responses. Again: pity that for now it has only been done in debut daybut it is to be hoped that there will be other occasions in which Calenda will be able to interact with followers.
A little bit missing graphic consistency in the titles and covers (some videos have them, others don’t, the texts overlap the hashtags) and a link is missing to exit TikTok, but the profile has the potential to work: collect over 33 thousand likes in 4 days it is not cheap. Especially for someone who “when I dance I look a bit like a drunk bear”.
Silvio Berlusconi (vote: NC)
The former Knight was supposed to land on TikTok earlier this week, to be precise on Monday, August 29: he himself had announced it during a telephone connection with La Piazza, the Italian Affairs event in Ceglie Messapica, in the province of Brindisi. He had spoken of “contents dedicated to this particular means of communication”.
At the moment, however, there is no trace of Berlusconi on the ByteDance social network: there are only many fake and a particularly active profile of supporters (Amici di Silvio) which has just over 60 thousand followers. From Italian Tech we asked Forza Italia for clarification, but we were unable to obtain confirmation on a possible new debut date. For now, therefore, the judgment is suspended.
Matteo Salvini, 535 thousand followers (vote: 8)
Net of the controversy, it is indisputable that the leader of the League is a social network machine: whether he does well or not, he definitely knows how to talk to the public about the various platformsas evidenced by his success both on Facebook and on TikTok, where not only has he passed the mark of half a million followers, from where he has also almost 7 million likes. Which are a really important number.
On the ByteDance social network, his profile is rich, varied and very well cared for: there are also 3 videos pinned at the top (all relatively recent), which is a practice that not many do but useful for pushing precise messages, there is attention to the use of music and there are links to the Instagram profile and the channel on Youtube. Above all there is a lot, a lot of constancy: on average, Salvini publishes 2-3 videos a day on TikTok, and it’s rare to find days without any content. And his community responds: there are many videos that exceed a million or even 2-3 million views.
Giuseppe Conte, 235 thousand followers (vote: 8)
His TikTok, former premier Conte, leader of the 5 Star Movement, proposes a mix of content created specifically for this social network and videos taken from television hosts and events. In this sense, ad hoc content seems to work more than anything else: there is a video, in which Conte comments on Giorgia Meloni’s programwhich to date has over 5.5 million views, which is a bit of a record for Italian politics.
The presence of Conte, in short, does not seem one of those that aspires exclusively to capitalize on a fashionable digital space: on the contrary, it seems designed for TikTok, for that target and for those modes of use. Often, the former premier begins videos with expressions such as “attention” and “eye, guys”: a way to encourage users to stop their thumbs and listen and not immediately move on to the next video. In the light of these considerations, Conte’s profile can be said to work really well. The same video response to Meloni, in addition to having more than 5 million views, has more than 10 thousand comments.
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Giorgia Meloni, 100 thousand followers (vote: 7)
“Io I am Giorgia, I am a woman, I am a mother”: To evaluate the presence on TikTok of the leader of the Brothers of Italy, one can only start from this audio, perhaps the first political sound to go viral on the platformwhose hashtag has exceeded 38 million views.
Net of this rebound popularity, Meloni’s profile offers content that does not always seem designed specifically for the platform, starting from square format, not perfect for TikTok vertical design. None of the videos published on the profile exceeds one million views, but a couple stop just above 900 thousand. Could probably do more, ma (as they explained to us by the party) obviously this is not the space on which he decided to bet.