Daljit Bhurji, MD of Diffusion PR, told PRWeek: 'The US elections are almost like a PR laboratory. They happen every four years, lots of people experiment and the results are fascinating for people in the PR industry regardless of the sector in which you work.'

Bhurji said both candidates had been cleverly using platforms such as Facebook and YouTube. But he suggested the campaigns had performed less effectively when it came to buying up Google adwords.

Bhurji suggested that both campaigns missed a trick by not bidding for the term 'lipstick on a pig' - which landed Obama in hot water last month. He said: 'You could have linked to the attack ads that McCain released as soon as that was said, (or) linked to the speech that Obama made where he said this was all a storm in a teacup.'

Bhurji is a former associate director at Hotwire and the youngest person in PRWeek's 2008 Power Book.

Watch Daljit Bhurji discuss the role the web is playing in US elections at prweek.com/uk.