London mayoral election: Here’s who’s winning on Twitter

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As Londoners head to the polls, it'll be another day until we find out the winner, but there's already one Boris replacement on social media – when it comes to mentions, at least.

It's Labour candidate Sadiq Khan who's the most talked about on Twitter for the last seven days, and since the very start of the year, ahead of rival Conservative candidate Zac Goldsmith.

The other candidates failed to get the chatter going in comparison to the main two contenders.

The sentiment of tweets has edged into positive territory over the course of the year, despite claims of negative campaigning swirling, according to the data from social media monitoring firm BrandWatch.

 

In contrast to mentions, it was the #BackZac2016 hashtag which has been the most used of the campaigning period. Research by the The Centre for London and the Centre for Analysis of Social Media at Demos (CASM) indicates a more coordinated digital campaign by Goldsmith, while it found a spread across several hashtag's in support for Khan.

While Khan received a large amount of positive tweets – and more than rival Goldsmith – it was in fact Green party candidate Sian Berry who Twitter was on board with more than anyone, according to their research.

It was housing, understandably that got the Twitterati chattering as the biggest campaign issue among voters, according to BrandWatch

Twitter may be loved for its interaction and responsiveness, but the researchers identified that both Sadiq and Goldsmith are pretty bad at replying, using it as a tool for broadcasting rather than engagement.