Ping Lacson's FB page grows steadily but not at par in size with competitors'

Editor’s note: Sixth in a series by ABS-CBN News on the presence on Facebook of Halalan 2022 presidential candidates.

Presidential aspirant Sen. Panfilo “Ping” Lacson addresses the crowd during his party's proclamation rally at the Imus City Grandstand in Cavite on Feb. 8, 2022. George Calvelo, ABS-CBN News — Presidential aspirant Sen. Panfilo “Ping” Lacson addresses the crowd during his party's proclamation rally at the Imus City Grandstand in Cavite on Feb. 8, 2022. *George Calvelo, ABS-CBN News*

MANILA - Presidential candidate Sen. Panfilo Lacson's Facebook page has been steadily growing in following and interactions since 2016 but these numbers paled in comparison to the volume that his competitors' pages were registering during the same period.

Lacson, on his second attempt at the presidency, ranks fifth in terms of Facebook page following among all presidential candidates, according to data generated by ABS-CBN News from content discovery and social monitoring platform CrowdTangle.

Experts have said that social media would be a significant component of the campaign to win Monday's election, although no one can say for sure the degree to which it could sway voter decision-making.

Many Halalan 2022 candidates have even strengthened online campaigning, going beyond the traditional way of TV, radio, print advertisements and on-ground sorties. Lacson himself had online ads.

In the data generated from CrowdTangle for 2021, Lacson’s Facebook followers numbered to below half a million.

Lacson's major competitors like incumbent Sen. Manny Pacquiao, former Sen. Ferdinand "Bongbong" Marcos Jr., Manila Mayor Isko Moreno Domagoso and Vice President Leni Robredo all have at least a million followers on the popular social networking site.

Pacquiao is way ahead with his 18.61 million Facebook followers, followed by Domagoso’s 5.40 million followers, Marcos Jr.’s 4.36 million followers, and Robredo’s 1.79 million followers. Lacson is in the fifth place with his 412,800 total followers. These pages were measured at the close of 2021.

Before Facebook introduced the 'follower' button and used 'page likes' to identify a user’s support to an account, Lacson's page only had 151,900 page likes in 2016. That year, he was at the bottom rung among the 2022 presidential candidates who already had Facebook pages that time, while Pacquiao was on top with his 11.70 million page likes.

Looking into Lacson's page growth in terms of likes, the incumbent senator gained 237,100 new page likes in a span of five years from 2016-2021.

From 2016, Lacson’s Facebook account has been generating less than a million total interactions (likes, comments and shares). His page peaked at 2.39 million total interactions just last year.

Lacson’s top 5 Facebook posts for 2021 included three photo posts of his economic agenda, opinion on the pork barrel system and on receiving government services through the national ID which he authored and sponsored in the Senate, a video of Pharmally executive Lincoln Ong and former presidential economic adviser Michael Yang during the Senate’s investigation of the Pharmally issue, and a shared link of the tiwalasabakuna.ph website, a website dedicated to COVID-19 vaccine 101.

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CAROUSEL of Lacson’s top 5 Facebook posts in 2021

Since 2016, Lacson's top Facebook post are mostly about his work. This contrasts with his Senate colleague and fellow presidential aspirant Senator Manny Pacquiao, a Facebook ‘rock star’ among presidential candidates, whose top posts where about his family and his boxing engagements before retiring.

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CAROUSEL of Lacson’s top Facebook posts from 2016-2021:

Conversation about Lacson across Facebook reached below 5 million total interactions (reactions, comments, and shares) from 2016 to 2020. When election season set in in 2021, his total interactions skyrocketed to 22,351,952 from the 96,192 posts about him scanned by CrowdTangle.

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Carousel of Lacson Facebook conversation from 2016-2021

Meanwhile, in Pulse Asia’s latest survey done April 16-21 and released May 1, Lacson placed fifth with 2 percent, maintaining the same ranking and percentage he got in March.

ABS-CBN News has reached out to the office of Lacson to seek his comment about his performance on Facebook and to inquire about his overall social media strategy. The Lacson camp acknowledged ABS-CBN News' message but did not give any statement yet as of this report's posting.

Ping Lacson's FB page grows steadily but not at par in size with competitors'

Sherwin Tinampay, ABS-CBN News

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