The first #DemDebate may not have been everyone's cup of tea this week, but it certainly told quite the social media story. We've got insights from all the social data around this story, and more from this week.
From #SpiritDay to a Wonka-style Lucky Charms contest, let's dive into the data.
#DemDebate
You might not have heard, but the Democratic presidential candidates had their first televised debate on CNN this past Tuesday, and while there have been many stories around who is believed to have put on the best performance, there is certainly one, clear social winner. below we provide a snapshot of the social conversations around the debate as it unfolded.
Volume
The first Democratic debate garnered more than 831K online mentions, and while this conversation is quite large for a two-and-a-half-hour timeframe, it is still smaller than both Republican debates.
An argument can be made as to which candidate performed best during the debate, but there is no question as to who garnered the most online mentions. That honor belongs to Bernie Sanders - far and away.
Sanders was mentioned more than 407K times online. More impressive still, Sanders had more online mentions than the rest of the debate participants combined. While Sanders took the top-spot in terms of mention volume, the rest of the candidates accumulated:
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Webb more than 163K online mentions.
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Clinton more than 131K online mentions.
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Chafee more than 72K online mentions.+
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O'Malley more than 28K online mentions.
Peak moments
When we examine the ebb and flow of the conversation across candidates, we can see which instances provoked the largest reactions. Bernie Sanders was the cause of two of these moments. In fact, he was the cause of the top two moments with peak mentions.
The the largest peak was in reference Clinton's email debacle. When Sanders said, "The American people are sick of hearing about your damn emails" that moment registered over 12K online mentions.
The second largest peak, also belonging to Sanders, occurred when Sanders introduced himself, and the issues that he plans to tackle at the very beginning of the debate. This moment received over 7K online mentions.
The third largest peak belonged to Jim Webb when he sparred with Anderson Cooper about running over his allotted answer time. This minute registered well over 5K mentions.
Sentiment
The overall debate boasts a positive sentiment as 62.2% of sentiment-categorized mentions were positive.
When examining each candidate's individual sentiment, Bernie Sanders finds himself at the front of the pack again. Within sentiment-categorized mentions:
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69% of Bernie Sanders' mentions were positive.
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66% of Chafee's mentions were positive.
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61% of O'Malley's mentions were positive.
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56% of Clinton's mentions were positive.
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47% of Webb's mentions were positive (53% negative).
TWITTER INSIGHTS
Bernie Sanders goes three-for-three as his Twitter handle accumulated the most impressions of all the candidates during the debate. Sanders' handle accrued more than 1.4 billion impressions. Sanders is followed by:
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Clinton with over 418 million impressions.
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Webb with more than 256 million impressions.
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Chafee with over 243 million impressions.
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O'Malley with more than 129 million impressions.
Demographics
Men hold a slight majority in conversation contribution as 56% of unique Twitter authors are male.
The issues that mattered more to women were #BlackLivesMatter and climate change, while men appear to be more interested in foreign policy.
Playboy's change of heart
This week Playboy announced that it will no longer publish images of nude models, and the people had a reaction.
We examined mentions of Playboy on Twitter, and within the last seven days Playboy has accumulated more than 120K mentions. When examining mentions day-by-day, you can see that the majority of mentions occurred today on October 13, the day the announcement was made, with over 52K. The following days show how the announcement's reaction bolstered Playboy's mentions.
The sentiment around Playboy over the past seven days is nearly identical, but when we look at sentiment day-over-day, Playboy's sentiment for October 13 is more negative, as 52% of sentiment-categorized tweets are negative. Again, this is the reflection of the reaction to Playboy's announcement.
This conversation is being driven largely by men, as men account for 64% of all unique Twitter authors.
With Tuesday's mentions of Playboy accounting for 43% of total mentions over the past seven days, it is clear that people were reacting to the news coming from Playboy HQ.
The luckiest of charms
Have you heard the news? There are 10, yes ten, boxes of Lucky Charms that are nothing but marshmallows. With the limited supply of marshmallow-only boxes, we can't help but feel like this is the closest thing to getting a golden ticket to explore Willy Wonka's chocolate factory.
The internet is reacting accordingly as the marshmallow-only conversation has grown to over 19K mentions, with the large majority happening on Thursday and Friday.
Of course, this glorious marshmallow hunt has a positive sentiment - at a large majority too. Within sentiment-categorized mentions, 73% are positive. The only reason for negative mentions is remorse that there are more boxes solely comprised of marshmallows.
With "Wishes do come true" making a strong showing in the conversation's major topics, we can't help but wonder what's next? The four-day work week? Thank you, Lucky Charms, for making dreams come true.
Social activism wore purple for anti-bullying #SpiritDay
The hashtag #SpiritDay has been used over 117K times on Twitter, with the sentiment of this conversation being extremely positive. Within sentiment-categorized tweets, 92.2% are recognized as being positive.
The main message within these mentions is support and unity for LGBT youth, and an end to bullying. Mentions about wearing the color purple are also quite prominent within this discussion.
These messages permeate the conversations top hashtags as well. #SpiritDay has accumulated more than 1.4 billion impressions, while hashtags like #ChooseKindness and #NoH8 have also racked-up millions of impressions.
We also saw an outpouring of support from celebrities as their tweets with the hashtag were among the conversation's most popular.