Palin's Supporters Didn't Watch Her Video on Facebook

Sarah Palin's web video about "Mama Grizzlies" caught lots of attention in the media, but apparently not many of her followers watched it. (Or, rather, they didn't find it through her Facebook network.) This could be disappointing, or not, depending on how one looks at it: Palin's supporters already support her, while mainstream media exposure grants her a new audience to pitch. The Nation's Ari Melber breaks down the stats on Facebook and video views:

In the week since it was first posted on Palin's Facebook page, which boasts over 1.8 million backers, the video has drawn 368,000 views.  Yet despite her large following, only 33,000 people watched the video via Facebook, according to YouTube statistics. That means only one out of ten viewers found "Mama Grizzlies" through Palin's social network -- and under 2 percent of her Facebook community watched the video.  So who did watch "Mama Grizzlies"?  

Mostly traditional news readers and Palin detractors.

Almost a third of all views came through an article on Yahoo! News, for example, while ratings for the video ran almost two-to-one for "dislike" over "like."  "The bulk of the views seem to come after it had been covered in the mainstream media," observes Pete Warden, a social media analyst who has  Palin's Facebook strategy. "She is still reaching a lot more people indirectly through the media than through Facebook and Twitter and the other direct channels," added Warden, a former engineer at Apple.

Read the full story at The Nation.