Urban Jacksonville

Screen shot 2009-10-02 at 9.49.56 AM

Disclaimer: This is not an endorsement of either candidate, just an objective look at their campaign websites.

Correction Â» Saturday October 3rd 2009

I’ve discovered, through the research of a commenter, that the Mike Hogan website below is NOT the website of the Mike Hogan running for Mayor of Jacksonville. So, in an attempt to correct this I have saved the original post here as a PDF and updated this post. Apologies to the Hogan campaign and his current or future online strategist. Once Hogan gets his website together I’ll revisit the analysis.

Yesterday Audrey Moran and Mike Hogan announced their intent to run for mayor of Jacksonville in 2011. What struck me about this announcement and subsequent research was the completely different experiences I had when I visited the candidate websites.

Audrey Moran Â» imwithaudrey.com

Audrey Moran appears to have a good base for her future online strategy. One thing I’m happy to see is the use of video on the homepage. Audio and video are key to producing engaging online experiences.

It’s also way to build a relationship and face recognition with people who visit the site. I would recommend enabling the video embed code so people can place it on their own websites. I would also upload the video to YouTube, Vimeo and Facebook. All places where people can copy the embed code and share the video.

There are clear calls to action, donate and media room so people have a sense of what they can do on the site. If the goal is to have people donate, I would say this design accomplishes the goal, it’s the first thing my eye moves to when I view the homepage.

The Moran campaign also plans to use Twitter and Facebook (not set up yet) to build an online community of voters. High on the Twitter list of to-do’s would be completing the profile with an icon and a description. I’d also like to see a campaign blog at some point.

I’ll take a look at the effectiveness of these things once they get up and running.

To Sum It Up

There’s a new, untapped generation of voters who are immune to messages in direct mail and campaign commercials, they expect to be engaged in a different way. Engaging those people will be key. Mike Hogan, Audrey Moran or anyone running for Mayor will need to fully embrace digital media to see success in 2011.

This entry was posted on Friday, October 2nd, 2009 at 11:36 am and is filed under Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

John

And the campaign Twitter ID for bein' 'with' her...has 18 people followed/following...with Tweets 'protected'.

That's not engaging...that's a 'clicque' campaign.
John

After closer reflection, my take is if Moran herself is the account holder it's very possible a 'learning curve' of using Twitter. It happens.

On the other hand if this is part of her campaign handled by a third party using online networking, she needs to understand her online presence isn't getting the payoff it could.

If it only takes one vote to win or lose when you get down to it...doesn't it matter?

Just sayin'.
Joey Marchy

John, you are absolutely right on this one. The fact that tweets are protected shows they are not prepared to use the medium, nor understand it's value.

I expect to see the tweets unlocked at some point. Good point!
John

Looks like someone took the point. ;)
Joey Marchy

I've made a correction to this post. The website previously mentioned WAS NOT the campaign website of Mike Hogan running for mayor of Jacksonville. Love ya Mike!

Read my full correction here.

I will revisit the analysis once Mike Hogan launches his real website.
gmwilliams

Whoever designed Mike Hogan's campaign website should be terminated. In politics, perception is everything. As a native Jacksonvillian who lives in the suburbs of Washington, DC ... I am proud of the images of my hometown: The skyline, the St. Johns River, Hemming Plaza, the Landing. The first thing I noticed is that Mike Hogan is running for Mayor but yet he has the image of the U.S. Captiol and an American flag flying backwards (maybe that is an indicator of the direction of his campaign) The imagery says he is running for Congress but his banner is saying he is running for Mayor. If you are not proud of your hometown by using its images, then you are not ready to be Mayor.

The imagery comment can be equally applies to Audry Moran .. instead of using a campaign sign as the backdrop, they could have used a picture of the family next to Friendship Fountain or with the Northbank behind them.

If either Moran or Hogan want to be Mayor of the "Bold New City of the South" -- then be proud of the city you want to lead and use its images on your website!
Name

Do a 'whois' lookup for mikehoganformayor.com and you would see that it is registered to

Registrant:
teacherincome.com
Michael Hogan
898 Washington Ave
Township of Washington, NJ 07676
US
Phone: +1.2012639656
Email: mike@radiohogan.com

Doesnt look like this is the correct site. Was this site given out by Mike Hogan (Jax) or did you just google for it?
Joey Marchy

Quick correction that I will elaborate on later. You are correct, this IS NOT Mike Hogan (Jacksonville) for Mayor. Thanks for researching this and correcting me. I looked into it further and I plan to update this post with a correction tonight when I have more time.

I'll archive this post and link to it from another article I will post that will simply state my evaluation of Audrey Moran's website. Effectively removing this post since the site I based my Mike Hogan analysis on was not his.
Frontrow

Mike Hogan and the current Mayor have had several cose door meetings. You can only guess what was said. " Lets give the more of the same and would you scratch my back ,pal" Audery Moran worked in the Delaney Adminstration and we ended up with a mess from that. Can we get someone to run that is not a recycled "Good Old Boy". The elite of this town our positioning there self to keep the "Good Old boy" network rolling!
vicupstate

Delaney was not a 'mess'. The Preservation project alone is an excellent legacy. There is more land in that project than the City of Boston.

Delaney made a few mistakes, but anyone would have. For the most part he did a great job. The Better Jax Plan was bold an forward-thinking. Nothing of that claiber or even close has been seen since.
Bryce

Fixed this forz ya, Joey :
There’s a new, retarded & incurious generation of voters who think that getting a dumb IM from Twitter or "friending" the candidate makes them "informed" and part of "social media" , they expect to know something about candidates, issues, and campaigns without doing any sort of learning, reading, or thoughtful engagement. But, hey, Twitter and Facebook and "social media" ARE GOING TO CHANGE HOW A CUTTING EDGE GENERATION ENGAGES IN POLITICS: by, you know, taking out the actual intellect required to hold complex views on complex subjects.
Chad

Really? Wow, calling the younger voting generation retarded & incurious, that's a great way to open up some dialoged.

I think you missed the point of the article, by candidates embracing technology they can reach out to not only a larger demographic, but a younger one as well.
If you don't feel websites and social media can spark interest and cause people to do some research on the candidates, what do you suggest?

Oh, and by the way, “social media” did change how a cutting edge generation engages in politics. The Obama campaign proved it.

But then again, I must not know anything about intellect, complex views, and complex subjects because I use Facebook and Twitter.
Bryce

Yeah, and as an Obama supporter and voter, we had one of the most ill-informed voting bases ever. Kids who couldn't articulate a single reason why they were voting for him beyond "He isn't Bush", or "Dude, he like tweets and stuff". And, yes, I was really impressed how 140 character dispatches really put out a lot of really solid, informative stuff.
Man, you can really discuss policy great over Facebook and Twitter instead of just using them to invoke hollow platitudes that have no force behind them, right?
Adam B

wow. such a contrarian viewpoint. you must be really smart.

while 140 characters is limited, it can be used to link to sites, whether it's the candidate's website or a news article. additionally, it reminds the person of the candidacy, which is part of the battle.

where there uninformed voters? sure. but i can also tell you that my sister, who doesn't give politics a second of thought a day, could competently discuss many points of Obama's platform, mainly because of twitter and facebook information.

twitter is a lot more than p-ditty and perez hilton.
Bryce

I thought about this discussion this weekend. I think one reason health care reform is struggling so mightily is because all the younger voters who were "utilized" and "fired up" via vacuous, limited communications, now have no idea what, exactly, Obama's policies are, particularly on this subject.
It would be foolish to say that NO ONE can become educated through links, etc, disseminated via Twitter, but to think it led to a massive, educated bloc of voters who are now going to support and push through his ambitious agenda? I don't see it, sorry. I think many of the people who are voluminous users of Twitter and the like are so obssessed with their own ideas about it, and its supposed and perceived power, that they cannot take a step back and realize, yes, this is a very, very limited means of communication, ESPECIALLY with regard to political discourse.
Abel Harding

I'm not sure what's up with Hogan's site...he didn't file yesterday as he had previously stated he would, so I'm not sure if they decided to pull back and avoid competing stories on the same day or what. Regardless, the site should have been offline until the announcement. You want to step out of the starting gate with all of your ducks in a row and allowing a website to be visible during the building process doesn't really accomplish that.

And, good point about the embed option. I was trying to add the video to my Vodpod collection last night and couldn't capture it...hopefully they will add that option soon. (I look for an account at YouTube.com/imwithaudrey, but I didn't see one yet.) On the next video...I'd pull the focus a little tighter and have the candidate's face taking up most of the screen...it makes it more personal. But, I'm impressed with the initial rollout...a kick-off party that was announced via social media, video on the site, Twitter... Jax is going to come into the new century!
hdesign

How embarrassing for Mike Hogan. Have we learned nothing from Obama? World-class branding and design brought a relatively unknown politician from Chicago to the White House. This stuff matters.

I bet Mrs. Moran's site is helping her develop brand awareness and raise money right now.

I recommend Mr. Hogan take that site down immediately and put up a splash page. Then develop an integrated online strategy.

Audrey Moran Vs. Mike Hogan Â» Mayoral Website Faceoff

Correction Â» Saturday October 3rd 2009

Audrey Moran Â» imwithaudrey.com

To Sum It Up

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