Republicans are going to have to ratchet up their social media presence if they want to compete with the Democrats' operation this election season.

There's a significant difference between the Twitter and Facebook presence of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and the National Republican Congressional Committee, according to data compiled by software and analytics firm, OhMyGov Inc.

The DCCC started off 2012 with just over 475,000 Facebook fans compared to the NRCC's 23,400. On Twitter, the gap isn't so large, the DCCC had 39,763 followers on Jan. 1 to the NRCC's 20,878.

Over the past two months, both organizations have seen their social media presence increase. As of Feb. 20, the DCCC has increased their twitter following 17.4 percent to 46,367 and their Facebook fans by 29.4 percent to 615,000. Their Facebook fans saw large increases on Jan. 25 - 26, the day after President Obama's State of the Union Address, and from Feb. 8 - 10, the two days after Rick Santorum was declared the winner of the Missouri, Colorado and Minnesota caucuses.

The NRCC has also been steadily curating followers. Since Jan. 1, they have increased their Facebook fans by 75.2 percent to 40,682 and Twitter followers 28.4 percent to 26,644. They've made a public push for Twitter followers by posting a large banner on the front page of NRCC.org that says: "Follow us on Twitter: Click Here."

The DCCC has been using its Twitter account to attack Republican candidates as well as to galvanize support around trending issues, such as last week's contraception debate. Recently the account has posted a number of links to news articles about Congressman Michael Grimm (R-NY), who has come under fire for improper fundraising and close business ties to a convicted criminal.

Across the social media pong on Facebook, the DCCC's account focuses on polls and petitions. The polls ask their fans to weigh in on issues and the petitions urge them to "support President Obama's budget" or "Call out Eric Cantor." In order to participate in the polls, Facebook users have to authenticate their account with the DCCC. To do so, the organization asks permission to access basic information such as name, gender, networks, list of friends and current city. They also ask for permission to send users email.

The Republicans post less frequently, only about once per day on their Facebook page. About half of their posts link to their nrcc.org blog, which is filled with criticisms of President Barack Obama and Democratic Party policies. Since the beginning of the year, all 65 of their posts attacked the Democrats.

The RNCC Twitter account takes a similar line, focusing on alleged Democratic policy failures by linking to their blog and frequent tweets about high unemployment.

For example, recent tweets include "12.8 million unemployed Americans... #failedstimulus" and "Is #Solyndra Obama's idea of an economy built to last?"

Perhaps both sides' increasing negative tone has turned off average Americans. The U.S. boasts 116 million Facebook users, with about 15 percent of those users declaring themselves liberal and 10 percent conservative, according to Mashable.com. That leaves both parties' organizations missing out on reaching about 15 million possible supporters through Facebook. And about 13 percent of adult Americans use Twitter, according to Pew Research. So even if only 10 percent of Twitter users hold strong political beliefs, that leaves about 5 million people who may be interested in DCCC or NRCC messaging on Twitter.