Twitter, Chavez–Chavez, Twitter

Wait a sec, now? Wasn’t it just a few months ago that Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez was calling Twitter a terrorist threat? And didn’t he want to put a stop to gaming? But now, Mr. Chavez is all hip to the jive. While he may not be picking up Call of Duty any time soon, the president has taken to Twitter with the verified account of @chavezcandanga. As of publication, he already has 113,143 followers.

You’ll need to speak Spanish to read all two of Chavez’s tweets, but, rest assured every tweet is a 140 character update on the fight for socialist victory. Translated, his first tweet said “Hey how’s it going? I appeared like I said I would: at midnight. I’m off to Brazil. And very happy to work for Venezuela. We will be victorious!!”

Now those are a words of a man of the people. “Hey how’s it going”? Let’s go and share a beer, my man.

As far as PR campaigns go, this one makes sense even if we do joke about it. When it comes to the media, you can rarely beat them, so you might as well join them. Chavez has clearly learned that if everyone’s on Twitter, he should be to.

And those in charge in Venezuela are not being shy about the strategy:

“The opposition thinks it owns the social networking sites. They think Twitter and Facebook belong to them,” said Diosdado Cabello, head of the state-run telecommunications regulator.

With only two tweets, Twitter hardly belongs to Mr. Chavez. But he’s been able to generate quite a following even without saying anything all that special. Maybe he should start his own social media marketing strategy company: maximize your followers just by being a South American president.

[via USA Today]