Livingston

May
20
2007

How Do The Top Presidential Candidates’ New Media Initiatives Stack Up?

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Updated 5/21 at 8:28 a.m.

Lest people get the wrong idea, we wanted to highlight just a small portion of the DC public relations community’s work. Here’s a look at the new media efforts from the big three within each party’s presidential race. After all, political battles are where the best communicators in the world duke it out, right?

Democrats

Pretty cool stuff at YouTube! Check out Hillary Clinton’s YouTube page. This is social media at its best. Of course there’s counterpoint: Hilary Clinton’s blog is here. Recent entries include a rather lame attempt at justifying being a Wal-Mart board member… This blog proves DC is a great PR town, but a lousy graphic design city. Obligatory MySpace available, too.

Barack Obama’s blog is much hotter, with a lot more going on visually. Even more impressive is the My.Barack.Obama dashboard. These guys get social media. I’m not sold yet, so no sign up, but the access to community blogs, messenging and more was really quite savvy. This was the best use of social networking technology we’ve seen yet. Barack’s MySpace page… Obligatory, but Barack’s got more friends than Hillary.

John Edwards MySpace page was formatted a little weird. The Edwards blog was a lot like Hillary’s, and lacked the dynamism of Barack’s. Howver, the use of video and photo blogs is very good. The “multimedia tab” smacked of the 90s, and probably should be renamed Social Media.

Republicans

We like the name of Rudy Giuliani’s blog, The Buzz. There’s not much else to like on the official site, which in the search engines still say Rudy’s still exploring official candidacy. Are you kidding me? Fire the Madison Avenue ad guys and get a real DC-based PR wonk, Rudy. Of course you can put a Rudy widget (Hillary has widgets ,too) or the like on your blog. No official Rudy MySpace page. Whoops. Still trust those Madison Avenue guys, Rudy?

John McCain’s McCain Space made me laugh! That’s great. Who needs Rupert Murdoch anyway? Blogging’s not for kids, but this one could stand to use some more imagery. But hey, the man has a blog roll! And of course, a MySpace page. McCain’s pretty hip for an old guy.

Mitt Romney’s Five Brothers blog concept is a great idea. It really lets you into the family and get a feel for who these folks are while they pitch Mitt. However, the design is mediocre. Mitt TV on the same site is good, too, but not as savvy as Hillary’s YouTube page. Overall this site is not inspiring, and I hate the main font used on the menus. A bad courier-like font that makes the design look cheap. Hey Rudy, even Mitt Romney’s got a MySpace page.

Conclusion

The winner so far is Barack. I’ll give props to Hillary (YouTube is great) and McCain Space, too. However, I wonder when one of these campaigns will get really smart and start letting campaign supporters throughout the United States in on the content generation. Can you imagine the power of such a peering network, especially if it was open to the public? That would be truly leveraging the power of social networking technologies.

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by Geoff Livingston | Internet Marketing |

2 Responses to “How Do The Top Presidential Candidates’ New Media Initiatives Stack Up?”

  • The Buzz Bin » Blog Archive » Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and McCain Lead New Media Pack Says:

    May 21st, 2007 at 9:33 am

    [...] Our late night post yesterday (below) seems fitting as the Post reported on the current lacking nature of most GOP sites this morning. But who cares about that? Let’s talk about the big candidates. And of the big ones, Barack, Hillary and McCain have the nest new media initiatives. Read on for more. [...]

  • Tech on the Potomac Group Page - Blogdigger Groups Says:

    May 21st, 2007 at 1:08 pm

    Kramer auto Pingback[...] Edit this Group Tech on the Potomac Mid-Atlantic based technology blogs, software development, java, .net, open source, xml, system integration and government contracting 3 hours, 46 minutes ago Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and McCain Lead New Media Pack by Geoff Livingston in Internet Marketing Our late night post yesterday (below) seems fitting as the Post reported on the current lacking nature of most GOP sites today. But who cares about that? Let’s talk about the big candidates. And of the big ones, Barack, Hillary and McCain have the best new media initiatives. Read on for more…. [ more - ] The Buzz Bin - - 3 hours, 46 minutes ago - Feed - Focus 4 hours, 56 minutes ago Albright Gets New Communications Director by Laura Gross in people Former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright has a new communications director. Jennifer Friedman will be joining The Albright Group to handle Sec. Albright’s communications needs. Jennifer will be leaving her job as director of state communications for the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids…. [ more - ] Potomac Flacks - - 4 hours, 56 minutes ago - Feed - Focus 7 hours, 58 minutes ago Did Apple censor its online forum? by alice in Apple, Litigation, Consumer Relations, Online Communications Lawsuit claims LCD screens on Apple’s current notebooks are not capable of millions of colors The complaint also points out that many of the disgruntled customers posted messages on Apple’s own forums only later to have their posts moderated or completely removed by Apple forum administrators. “It a… [ more - ] Presto Vivace Blog - - 7 hours, 58 minutes ago - Feed - Focus 9 hours, 50 minutes ago Protecting your Competitive Advantages in Open Source by Keith Casey in business development, Micro ISV, Open Source Integration One of the biggest benefits of Open Source Software is the fact that you can customize it completely towards your needs and business processes. Unfortunately, it also tends to be one of the biggest drawbacks. Yes, you can customize, tune, and generally make it fit exactly what you're looking for… [ more - ] CaseySoftware, LLC - Supporters & Developers of dotProject - Connecting Developers, Building Worlds - - 9 hours, 50 minutes ago - Feed - Focus 13 hours, 29 minutes ago Supermarket Plus Web 2.0 Equals Supermarket 2.0 by Chris Abraham in web 2.0 … [ more - ] Chris Abraham - Because the Medium is the Message - - 13 hours, 29 minutes ago - Feed - Focus 15 hours, 12 minutes ago The Flattening of Politics - posted by Sofie Leon The theme for this year’s Personal Democracy Forum was “The Flattening of Politicsâ€? but the agenda was anything but flat. I was thrilled to attend and really excited EchoDitto was a sponsor. The whole day was full of excellent speakers and really interesting applications of technology to the politic… [ more - ] EchoDitto blogs - - 15 hours, 12 minutes ago - Feed - Focus 15 hours, 41 minutes ago How Do The Top Presidential Candidates’ New Media Initiatives Stack Up? by Geoff Livingston in Internet Marketing Updated 5/21 at 8:28 a.m. Lest people get the wrong idea, we wanted to highlight just a small portion of the DC public relations community’s work. Here’s a look at the new media efforts from the big three within each party’s presidential race. After all, political battles are where… [ more - ] The Buzz Bin - - 15 hours, 41 minutes ago - Feed - Focus 21 hours, 16 minutes ago Review: Children of Men by Mark in The Arts What if human fertility ground to a total halt? This is the premise behind the 2006 movie Children of Men . The year is 2027 and it has been eighteen years since the last child was born. The movie surmises that human fertility is the glue that binds society together. As a result by 2027, with the ex… [ more - ] Occam’s Razor - - 21 hours, 16 minutes ago - Feed - Focus 22 hours, 25 minutes ago Chris Abraham is Officially an A-List Blogger of Note by Chris Abraham in a-listers I just discovered that Because the Medium is the Message placed a distant second (to Technosailer) on The Buzz Bin’s Top 12 DC Area New Media, PR & Marketing Blogs list…. [ more - ] Chris Abraham - Because the Medium is the Message - - 22 hours, 25 minutes ago - Feed - Focus Sunday, May 20, 2007 Will Subliterate 17-Year-Olds Save the Whales? by Chris Abraham in Don’t Save the Whales I received a very subliterate comment from Zayna in response to my blog entry, Don’t Save the Whales, which states, subliterately, “your stupid!!! dont say dont save the whales because you need to save yourself first. i love whales and im trying t save whales and im only 17 i have loving parents who… [ more - ] Chris Abraham - Because the Medium is the Message - - Sunday, May 20, 2007 - Feed - Focus  Results Pages:  1 2 3 4 5 …955 >> About    Blog © 2004 Blogdigger _qacct=”p-7bnDaRVo9mmrM”;quantserve(); [...]

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