Website Battle Royale. How do the Candidates’ sites match up?
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It’s an election year. No doubt about it. Every four years one rolls around and September hits. You are already seriously considering giving up TV and possibly even destroying it (not a horrible idea really). You sift through your mail with your eyes closed and if you feel a postcard you deposit it directly in the trash. Anybody standing on a street corner with a clipboard is the enemy and avoided like a victim of a plague. You have closed your blinds and duck taped your door bell in case the clip boards venture into your neighborhood. You avoid family that “lean the other way” or get really good at biting your lip (and the scars where just healing from four years ago). Yep, it’s an election year.
But recently election years have also hit us where most of us spend a lot of our time, probably more than our TVs in many cases. The internet. Many of us have facebook accounts, almost all of us have email accounts and we all participate in some kind of learning, shopping, stalking, ect. online. Politicians are smart, or at least the people working for them are. They know this and in recent years have made incredible steps to keep up with recent online trends. The 2008 Obama campaign was eye opening for many people. His team realized that we were spending a lot of time on the WWW and dedicated a large part of their campaign to target people on the internet. They heavily pushed social networking and had a blog on their website. They were on Twitter, Facebook and a lot of the online ad space available.
Websites for candidates aren’t anything new. The first presidential candidate websites go back to the 1996 Bobo Dole/Bill Clinton election. But as with everything else on the web, they have evolved. The’ve continued to develop new tactics and targets. MTV is out and Facebook is in for reaching the young voters of America. Being a web designer, and proponent of social networking for establishing a presence on the web, I think this is the one part of their campaigns that is fascinating. So how do the two current candidates websites match up from a design and social networking perpective?
1. Branding
[/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]Obama Website:Obama/Biden Logo
[/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third_end id=”” class=”” style=””]Romney Website:“R” Logo
[/wpcol_1third_end]Winner: Obama / The Obama logo is very well done. It’s smart, original, well designed and instantly recognizable. Romney’s “R”, by contrast, feels like it’s trying to copy a successful idea and fails because it’s boring and contained in an awkward blue block.Dissapointing considering how many designers are probably republican and would have been happy to contribute a better design.
[wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]2. Color Choice [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]Red, White and Blue [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third_end id=”” class=”” style=””]Red, White and Blue [/wpcol_1third_end]
Winner: Obama / No brainer here for our guys. You gotta use these colors. Both sites are primarily white (or off white) and blue, but Obama gets his initial red impact from a well done logo and an American flag and Romney get his from a poor copy logo and a “donate” button.
[wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]3. Implied Patriotism [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]Standing in front of big American flag [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third_end id=”” class=”” style=””]Dual Air High-Fives [/wpcol_1third_end]
Winner: Obama / While the air high-five is certainly American and speaks to teamwork and brotherly love, you gotta have the flag in there. In fact, Romney’s site doesn’t have a flag anywhere on the front page at all. Oversight for sure. This could be a Fortune 500 company’s corporate website for all we know and given the current state of politics maybe I should give the Romney site “props” for a being honest in that case.
[wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]4. Social Networking [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]Facebook is prominent with a tie into Twitter on his blog posts [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third_end id=”” class=”” style=””]Facebook, Twitter and Flickr are prominent [/wpcol_1third_end]
Winner: Romney / Four year after intruding the idea of tying into social networking on his campaign site, Obama is outdone by the other camp in this category. Maybe he just realized that Facebook was the only social networking site that offered any kind of value or maybe, like many of us, he just got tired of”keeping up with it.” Regardless, Romney has done more in this category on his site and I like his larger, site specific logo use and especially his use of Flickr. Kind of fun to see pics from his campaign even if they are mostly old wealthy people.
[wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]5. Use of a Blog [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]Front page of website is a cascading blog [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third_end id=”” class=”” style=””]Wonderful blogging is only a click away on the top nav bar [/wpcol_1third_end]
Winner: Obama / The main focus of the Obama/Biden site is a blog. It’s the front page and it feels like the site is more interactive and less static. And it’s well done. That’s not to say that the Romney blog isn’t an important element in his website, but it’s buried a layer deep in navigation and his site feels much more static up front. They do both, however, make good use of “like” buttons on their blog post and encourage people to interact with their social networking presence through their blog.
[wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]6. Calls to action [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]All about getting the user to make a decision and commit time/money/support [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third_end id=”” class=”” style=””]All about getting the user to make a decision and commit time/money/support [/wpcol_1third_end]
Winner: Tie / Both of these sites are littered with “calls to action” prompting the user to interact with the site. They have both done an outstanding job with this. Obamas’ messaging is a little clearer, but Romney made his buttons bright red and they practically yell at you to do something. I almost feel inadequate if I don’t.
[wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]7. Overall asthetic [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third id=”” class=”” style=””]Design/colors/imagery say modern, youthful, clean, trendy, light, casual and thoughtful [/wpcol_1third] [wpcol_1third_end id=”” class=”” style=””]Design/colors/imagery say power, confidence, heavy, elite and corporate [/wpcol_1third_end]
Winner: Obama / Blues and grays are the primary colors and even the red from the flag is muted a bit in the background of the image and doesn’t shout at you. Additionally the image of Obama in an unbuttoned dress shirt makes him feel very approachable and connected to a large segment of the American population. The entire Obama site seems to be very thoughtfully executed and should appeal to a relatively wide audience. The Romney site seems heavy because of the dark blues. The image of the candidates in dark suits and perfectly synched ties and combed hair screams elitist. And I’m sorry, but I just can’t get over the god awful “R” logo.
Conclusion:
I would love to get my hands on some analytics for these two site to see how each site is drawing traffic. Both parties have clearly embraced current web best practices and in a turn-around from 4 years ago, the Republican candidate’s social networking push is actually more prevalent on his site than the other guys. However, if I was voting purely from a web standpoint, I’d have to go with Obama. If only because I can’t stand that god awful Romney logo. You’re worth a lot of money Mr. Romney. You can afford a good logo.