Huntsman 2012 Website: The Bad

Let me start by saying something about the launch. I really felt for the digital team when the website was down. Anyone who is in this business and still snarkily tweeted something about it crashing hasn't launched enough websites in their career. Things happen.

Now to the Bad...

Bad:

The "Different" Design Is Impacting Navigation: It's really hard to get around. The store which should be a key driver for campaign dollars and new donors if used effectively is buried in the footer and relegated to certain sub pages. The "Reality Room" (a truth squad with it's own twitter account and good content) is also buried. These are two good examples of where the navigation is hurting the campaign.

Text size is too small: My parents (both Republican voters in Florida a must win state for this campaign) would break their laptop in frustration trying to read the text on this website. They aren't going to be alone in feeling this way.

The overuse of H: Hblog Hstore Hpress, HTV PLEASE STOP. WE GET IT. The one place you could use it (bumpersticker in store) you don't!

No Sense Of The Crowd: This website crashed. I am sure there are a couple of good reasons why. One of them was a surge in traffic which basically put a strain on everything else. People were curious about Huntsman and yet this website barely shows a trace of this interest (see blog post with 111 comments here as an exception). All of the 2012 GOP campaigns need to be better about reflecting this interest.

The Social Map application they have will move them in the right direction but it needs to be bigger than Facebook and spread throughout website.

I think the navigation is a really big issue that will hurt them down the line if they don't sort it out.

The last point about reflecting the support you have on your website is one of the biggest challenges facing any campaign online. I think it's a often neglected strategic thought during the planning phase of these things that has real world implications on undecided voters and hard core supporters. Both want to see themselves on the website for very different reasons. You can get there by reflecting the grassroots support a candidate has in an authentic manner.

Well anyway my two cents on some of what I see. Tomorrow, I will blog about the good things I see. And then sometime over the weekend, I will tackle their use of Facebook and Twitter in a separate post.