Military vs. Morsi: Facebook's Popularity Contest

Facebook fan pages are usually used to determine a brand’s popularity – but the same could be done for about political movements and figures.

The 30th of June 2013 was a very decisive date for Egypt – and the perception of its political figures changed tremendously on that significant day. Millions of people took the streets to voice their objection to Muslim-Brotherhood-affiliated President Mohamed Morsi. Shortly after, the Egyptian Military stepped in, ousted him and lay out a plan for the transitional period.

Ever since, Egypt’s political opinion has become – to a large extent – split between two major groups: those supporting the ousted president and his reappointment, and those supporting the Military in its decision to oust him.

The sudden rise in the army’s popularity is very visible and tangible through the statistics of its Facebook fan page. Following a generally upward trend, the Official Page of the Supreme Council of Armed Forces gained over 77,000 fans in one week starting on the 30th of July. Another remarkable development is that in that same week, the people talking about this page increased by almost 800%, reaching 84,697 people. The page has become Egypt’s fastest growing political page in the past month, reaching a total of 2,187,959 fans. Additionally, 85% of its fans come from Egypt.

Looking at the fan page of ousted President Morsi, things look bleaker – but not bad. Morsi has gained some popularity during his ouster by the military, as his Official Fan Page gained a bit over 80,000 likes during the week starting July 1st, 2013. The peak of the page’s engagement rate was achieved on July 7th, where people talking about this jumped from over 86,000 to over 271,000. Having 1,904,486 fans in total, it is worth mentioning that 71% of them are from Egypt.

So what does this tell us? Well, the only sure thing is that the Military and the Egyptian Police are at the peak of the Facebook popularity contest, putting Morsi on third place. Yet, this can change rapidly and with every step these political institutions and figures take, their popularity is at stake. For instance, the Global Muslim Brotherhood Association has risen to become the fastest growing political page for the day.

All statistics and graphs via Socialbakers.