Indiana Politics, Beer and #TweetSeats in Social Media

Indiana Politics, Beer and #TweetSeats in social media. These are not necessarily odd companions, but Indiana’s new governor did invite a select few to the Statehouse for his televised #INSOS address – and the few invited to the special VIP invite from Mike Pence were poised to get busy on their smartphones.

(Twitpic caption via Scott Wise, owner of Scotty’s Brewhouse eateries: Gov Pence and some guy that likes beer.)

How will Governor Pence fare in social media?

Well, let’s look at a few stats:

He has more than 38,000 followers – about the size of small Indiana city perhaps in a metro doughnut county adjacent to the state capitol. Indiana has more than 6.5 million residents.

He is following 39 people (& updating as we speak). Of those, 16 are Indiana journalists and only 2 are national journalists, including Jonathan Allen from Politico and Fox News co-anchor Martha MacCallum, The rest of his cast and characters are predictable GOP sorts. A few Statehouse reporters are oddly missing from the list in an apparent social media diss (or oversight).

Of the journalists in his followers, only three have more than 4,000 followers each – Gerry Dick at Inside Indiana Business, Abdul-Hakim Shabazz of IndyPolitics.org and Marybeth Schneider, who just peaked at more than 4,500 followers in her political coverage for The Indianapolis Star. Abdul pulls in the highest number of the three at more than 4,800.

The governor’s Twitter handle is @GovPenceIN, a little awkward. But it turns out there are a couple of other Mike Pence handles and names in the Twittersphere including a “builder of custom and white label crowdfunding solutions” based in Sarasota, Fla., and blogger of beer based in Cincinnati, Ohio, by the name of Mike Pence who uses the Twitter handle @BubsBeerBlog.

Lastly, can you catch the #INSOS via Twitter in case you missed it live this week?

The bitly link Tweeted by @GovPenceIN doesn’t work — “Something’s wrong here. Uh oh, bitly couldn’t find a link for the bitly URL you clicked.” The bitly fish is floating ominously upside down in the waves. And apparently no one is following enough to point it out to repair (still).

How about the last @INGovernor account listed for Mitch Daniels? He had more than 8,000 followers without ever uttering a single Tweet. And he followed only one person – his wife, Cheri.