Vitelli Crowned King of Latest Examiner Media Twitter Contest
Three of Examiner Media’s editors, Kerry Barger, Faith Ann Butcher and Andrew Vitelli, competed in a Twitter contest over the past month. And today Vitelli has been crowned Twitter King.
Vitelli, editor of The White Plains Examiner, earned the most new Twitter followers over the past month.
The contest began on Aug. 23 and ends today. With a sizable lead and his competitors acknowledging certain defeat, Examiner Media named Vitelli the winner in advance of tonight’s official 11:59 deadline.
In a prior statement, Vitelli said, “I appreciate the support and interest from the Tweeting community, and I hope I have been able to reward their faith with informative and enthralling Tweets.”
A similar contest held earlier this year was won by Butcher, who collected more followers than Vitelli in that two-person challenge. Vitelli’s dethroning of Butcher came as a surprise, with all of the competitors, Vitelli included, projecting Vitelli as the biggest long-shot to win.
Vitelli started with 121 devotees when the contest began last month. He now has 578 followers. His feed: @agvitelli
Butcher began play with the most followers, with 405 fans of her @faithannbutcher feed. She upped her total to 713.
Barger’s feed was newly-minted when the contest began and she quickly totaled 132 followers before the competition started. Because of her background in social media, Vitelli’s underdog status was solidified. But Barger’s @kerrybarger feed gathered the fewest new followers, with her current total of 336.
Barger is the assistant editor of The Putnam Examiner. Butcher is editor of The Northern Westchester Examiner and The Putnam Examiner. Butcher is handing over the top Putnam editor job to Barger by early winter. In fact, as the contest began to wind down last week, Barger tweeted that she had decided to drop out and “respectfully endorse my support to my partner in crime,@faithannbutcher, the big, bad QUEEN OF MEDIA.”
Vitelli’s prize for winning the challenge is a gift card to the Jacob Burns Film Center. (@jbfc_ny on Twitter.)
Examiner Media Publisher Adam Stone — @examinerstone on Twitter — will be announcing the next company contest within the next two weeks.
Adam has worked in the local news industry for the past two decades in Westchester County and the broader Hudson Valley. Read more from Adam’s author bio here.