Importance of on-line presence in a campaign
This morning I was checking the candidate’s websites to see if anything had changed recently. Something apparently was with Diane Cibrian’s site. It was down and had been all night. The absence of the site had me wondering if R’s comment in the debate open thread had some merit to it. I doubt that is the case but the sheer absence of the site these days sends a message of uncertainty to voters about the status of a candidate.
Cibrian’s not the only candidate to have this problem. Castro’s site was down throughout the day the Sunday after Castro’s campaign opening and a positive Express-News column by Jaime Castillo. That was a serious issue for Castro since he could have been collecting several donations as supporters motivated by the column. The site was up later that day and corrective actions have been taken to prevent further outages. I chalk that up to early campaign organization.
But this really drives at a deeper question of how important an on-line presence is these days. Obama’s campaign run proved it is very important. In the wake of one of the most successful campaigns in recent history having that always on, always ready website can give the candidate lift when the actual campaign is in downtime. The Internet has created a 24/7 society and the only way a campagin can meet the demands of that kind of culture is with a website that provides rich information and can collect money and contact information for the candidate.
I’ve started a process of rating campaign websites of the 2009 city elections and have found a mixture of technology capability. It’s interesting to see how the campaigns have employed Internet techniques. Most seem like early web approaches in which the content is haphazardly thrown on the page with no thought to message or delivery. Others seem to get the concept and provide some tools that help guide a voter to the message of the candidate.
Whatever the approach having a website that is up and running 24 hours a day is critical in today’s campaign strategies. Let’s hope this will serve as a learning lesson for Cibrian’s campaign.
