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Posted by Misty McLaughlin at May 20, 2008 03:00 PM CDT Categories: Advocacy , Social Media , Usability |
I love 2008.
To put a finer point on it, I love this particular presidential election year in the U.S. For the first time, all of our serious commander-in-chief contenders understand that Campaign Central for the majority of American voters is their website.
What does this mean? User experience matters.
You probably know the best-and-worst of the candidate website stories: In 2004, Howard Dean’s innovation in the online world marshalled grassroots support, gave voters on-the-ground ways to mobilize and to feel connected (let’s hear it for video games!), raised some serious dollars (on the order of $40 million), and united a community of support that got the attention of every candidate on both sides of the aisle.
Both in 2004 and early in this election cycle, we also saw a host of questionable campaign website decisions. The Bush/Cheney campaign’s interactive online feature, “Make Your Own Lawn Sign,” and Jim Webb’s PAC’s “post your diatribe to our homepage” features* come to mind. Both took risks in soliciting user-generated content (hurrah for the risk-taking!) but neither managed to thoughtfully moderate that content, leading to a lot of self-sponsored candidate abuse.
Today, nearing the general election, we’re now down to three candidates who all seem to get that voters want more than an interactive brochure. As John Sutton of Navigation Arts puts it, presidential candidates are coming to see their websites as “roadmaps to permanence,” investing in “usability for victory” – the idea that an intuitive, inspiring, effective online presence will actively shape a candidate’s chances of long-term success.
This involves more than a slick design and airbrushed photos of candidates kissing babies. If JohnMcCain.com, BarackObama.com, and HillaryClinton.com represent the future of effective campaigning in the online space, they also hold a lesson for all of us nonprofit campaigners (political or no): research, innovate, test, and iterate. Whether it’s your message or your visuals or your grassroots tactics, the only way to get more effective online is to try an idea with your users/voters, carefully gauge their responses, and translate what you learn into change**.
That, after all, is the beauty of the Web, this quickly maturing, most democratic of spaces – it’s a great testbed for innovation. Watch this space in the weeks and months ahead for some play-by-plays of each candidate’s website, as they rapidly iterate towards the White House.
*Exact names of these features have been paraphrased.
**Not to be confused with “change you can count on”.
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