Post Debate Twitter Follower Growth - Presidential Candidates (from 9/17 to 9/20)

[SamAdams76]

In the three days since the debates on Thursday night, we saw major jumps in Twitter followers among some of the candidates that did well.

The big surprise here is Carly Fiorina, who added 63,404 followers to leapfrog ahead of Ben Carson, who has been running number 2 in Twitter growth all summer long. Even more surprising, the growth in Donald Trump's followers is starting to slow, even though he remains at number one and it well out in front in terms of MTD (month to date) follower growth since September 1. For comparison, Trump added over 600,000 followers in August but is on track to add only about 350,000 this month.

On the Democratic side of things, socialist Bernie Sanders has added an amazing 110,000+ subscribers in the past three days. I can only guess that there is a major push in his camp to sign up Twitter followers. Now Sanders also has a Twitter handle for his senate seat (@SenSanders) that was growing quickly so perhaps his campaign is asking people to sign up for @BernieSanders as well - as that appears to be his formal Twitter handle for the 2016 presidential campaign.

Shrillary Clinton attracted only half as many followers in the same time period, with speculation that Jumpin' Joe Biden might jump into the race anyday now. When that happens, I expect Biden's follower growth to start rocketing upwards and we'll be tracking that here closely.

What this tells me is that there is a definite anti-Hillary movement afoot among the Democrats and among the Republicans, the three non-politicians continue to completely dominate the race as establishment favorite Jebbie Bush continues to see rather anemic growth - considering the fact that he had been selected by the GOP insiders to be the nominee this time around.

As Jebbie falters, the GOPe are scrambling for another establishment candidate. Marco Rubio appears to be gaining some momentum with regard to that and he has moved into 4th place for Twitter growth - right behind the three non-politicians.

Free Republic favorite Ted Cruz continues to hold steady in #6 position, in terms of follower growth.

Campaign is starting to get interesting. Will Carly hold her momentum? Will Trump stay on top? Will try to put out another update later this week.

[SamAdams76]

Due to HTML tables not formatting properly in main posting section, will post them below as a reply.

[SamAdams76]

Name	Twitter Handle	Total Followers 9/20/2015	Sep MTD	Since 9/16 Debate
Donald Trump	@realDonaldTrump	4,229,801	242,498	70,419
Carly Fiorina	@CarlyFiorina	557,112	87,794	63,404
Ben Carson	@RealBenCarson	654,674	121,885	51,363
Marco Rubio	@marcorubio	865,858	36,099	23,810
¿Jeb Bush	@JebBush	313,117	32,167	17,385
Ted Cruz	@tedcruz	508,258	24,206	10,192
Rand Paul	@RandPaul	688,113	13,171	6,768
Chris Christie	@ChrisChristie	51,824	7,914	6,229
John Kasich	@JohnKasich	109,313	8,694	5,924
Scott Walker	@ScottWalker	210,724	12,327	4,899
Mike Huckabee	@GovMikeHuckabee	406,970	8,038	4,394
Sarah Palin	@SarahPalinUSA	1,178,966	8,155	2,111
Bobby Jindal	@BobbyJindal	216,946	5,511	2,002
Linda Graham	@LindseyGrahamSC	27,185	2,394	1,643
Rick Santorum	@RickSantorum	244,034	3,185	1,284
Mitt Romney	@MittRomney	1,674,222	3,536	1,258
George Pataki	@GovernorPataki	52,868	2,984	1,207
Diamond and Silk	@DiamondandSilk	4,307	895	333
Jim Gilmore	@gov_gilmore	1,675	532	211

Name	Twitter Handle	Total Followers 9/20/2015	Sep MTD	Since 9/16 Debate
Bernie Sanders	@BernieSanders	564,151	171,107	110,073
Shrillary Clinton*	@HillaryClinton	4,289,738	143,404	50,492
Elizabeth Warren	@elizabethforma	167,746	18,402	12,234
Joe Biden	@JoeBiden	922,715	14,256	3,412
Martin O'Malley	@MartinOMalley	84,260	2,000	751
Jim Webb	@JimWebbUSA	14,062	804	266
Lincoln Chafee	@LincolnChafee	19,446	596	217

*Shrillary Clinton is under investigation for mishandling classified information and betraying the United States of America, she faces indictment and imprisonment. She is also a reprehensible phony that nobody likes. Also, she is a cheater as over 1/3 of her Twitter Followers are confirmed as FAKE.

[BigEdLB]

Trump gained 7k more than Fiorina

[SamAdams76]

Correct, and that is closest it’s been since I’ve been tracking this. Most of the summer, Trump was blowing everybody away in follower gains. Only Ben Carson was close.

[Jane Long]

Ugh....how does Marco The Rube have more followers than FioRINO or Cruz? And, how does FioRINO have more than Cruz? Bleh.

[onyx]

WOW!

Very interesting!

THANK YOU FOR THIS POST!

[Don Corleone]

Since there is no way to verify the numbers as being from real people the statistical conclusions are irrelevant. JMHO

[SamAdams76]

Some of these people have been accumulating Twitter followers for years. Many of Rubio's followers were inherited from his last run in 2012.

So I don't put much stock in how many total followers a candidate has. I try to measure the recent growth in followers, which is an indicator of momentum. That's why at the beginning of each month, I reset everything for a new month. I also look at the last few days and that is how I stack rank.

[Jane Long]

Thanks, Sam ;-)

[ObozoMustGo2012]

Uh oh... GOPe will need to ratchet up their “follow” and “like” bot programs for next debate.

[SamAdams76]

Actually no. I started this back in June as an experiment and found that the results tie in very well with the polls we are seeing.

There are a few candidates that "game" the system with fake followers such as Clinton but many other candidates have between 80-90% accuracy in their Twitter followers. This has been verified.

So with that accuracy rate, this is a very interesting way to track momentum and as mentioned earlier, it seems to tie out very well with the polling data we are seeing.

[Inyo-Mono]

Sam, love the way you have the Spanish “?” mark by Jeb’s name.

[SE Mom]

Look forward to your reports each week! Thank you.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3038621/More-2-MILLION-Hillary-Clinton-s-Twitter-followers-fake-never-tweet.html

2million of Hilary’s followers exposed as fake

[aMorePerfectUnion]

https://www.twitteraudit.com/Hillaryclinton

TwitterAudit.com report on the hildabeast list of followers...

[SamAdams76]

Good find. Thanks!

[BigEdLB]

This is all very interesting stuff and thank you for staying on top of things. I ran the numbers to see what a few hours would show. Since your survey the increases are as follows: Trump 382, Carson 199, Fiorina 182, Rubio 106... Also, The Beast 304. It will be interesting to see it play out over the next days.

[BigEdLB]

Increases from report:Trump 1,639. Carson 844 Fiorina 693. Rubio 462. Carly surge a blip?

[BigEdLB]

Increases from report: Trump 3,484. Carson 1,489 Fiorina 1,214. Rubio 786.