Website Review - Nelson Peters

People should be able to communicate with the campaign through the website
This website is a prototypical design except for not having an issues platform section

The campaign must be able to show who the candidate is (not just their name)
He does a good job of giving her personal history and background.

The campaign must express its platform/ issue positions. This is the most important purpose of the website
His platform is experience but there are no issue stances listed.

It must be easy to navigate.
The site is well designed for navigation.

Design should be clean and coherent to the branding plan of the campaign.
This is designed after John McGauley's website from last year. It is a good design.

The importance of having the issues is of utmost importance on a campaign website. Had it been listed this site would have garnered an A-.

GRADE D

http://www.nelsonpeters.com/

Website Review - Matt Kelty

People should be able to communicate with the campaign through the website
This website does a good job of communicating with voters. It has one aspect I haven't seen in the other websites. It has a ticker on the left column that runs letters to the editor that support his position on issues. It also has a link to his Myspace page.

The campaign must be able to show who the candidate is (not just their name)
It includes a normal bio piece. He even included pictoral references to his topics. Normally these wouldn't earn a reference in my reviews. But normally a candidate doesn't use a picture of themself with Dick Lugar to illustrate a professional relationship with a very popular elected official.

The campaign must express its platform/ issue positions. This is the most important purpose of the website
His issues are well-defined.

It must be easy to navigate.
The site is well designed for navigation.

Design should be clean and coherent to the branding plan of the campaign.
The branding here is interesting. He's trying to establish his campaign in the fashion of Ronald Reagan with his "City on the Hill" reference in his logo.

GRADE A-

http://www.mattkelty.com/

Website Review - Karen Goldner

For those unawares, Karen Goldner will be challenging longtime councilman Don Schmidt for the 2nd FW City Council District seat.

People should be able to communicate with the campaign through the website
The website includes all the standard areas for interacting with the voter. It also contains areas for both the press and her endorsements.

The campaign must be able to show who the candidate is (not just their name)
She does a good job of giving her personal history and background.

The campaign must express its platform/ issue positions. This is the most important purpose of the website
Her platform is easy to find and easy to read.

It must be easy to navigate.
The site is well designed for navigation.

Design should be clean and coherent to the branding plan of the campaign.
Can't complain about this aspect of the website.

GRADE B+


http://www.citizensforgoldner.com/

Hoeffel, Republican for Mayor

Before anybody gets bent out of shape about another candidate jumping into the race versus Kelty and Peters, Realize that this is the Republican nomination for the mayor of Garrett, Indiana to the north of Fort Wayne and west of Auburn (for the geographically challenged).

Her campaign asked that we review her campaign's website. I didn't even know anybody knew about us in the land of the railroader.

People should be able to communicate with the campaign through the website
The website does a great job of communicating and interacting with voters. She even has her own Facebook page which is something like Myspace and is becoming a new trend for candidates (more on that in a different post).

The campaign must be able to show who the candidate is (not just their name)
There is a problem here. While the website does a great job of telling who Tonya Hoeffel is as a candidate and a person, it is hard to find any reference to her last name. Voters need to know her last name when they go to the polls unless her opponent has a similar last name.

The campaign must express its platform/ issue positions. This is the most important purpose of the website
It does a very good job of hat between the website and facebook page.

It must be easy to navigate.
There were no problems here.

Design should be clean and coherent to the branding plan of the campaign.
While the design is clean and coherent, I have a problem with using the first name for branding except in certain situations. Part of the job of a website is to create name recognition with the platform of the candidate.

My experience shows that using the first name in branding a campaign doesn't translate that well at the polls. The importance of this function forces me to give this grade. Otherwise its on track with Adam Mildred's score.

GRADE C+


http://www.votefortonya.com/

Website Review - Adam Mildred

People should be able to communicate with the campaign through the website

This site successfully does this by areas for emailing the campaign and making contributions.

The campaign must be able to show who the candidate is (not just their name)

There is a biography section.

The campaign must express its platform/ issue positions. This is the most important purpose of the website

The platform is easily found and read.

It must be easy to navigate.

You can find anything in this website within two clicks. It is very easy to navigate.

Design should be clean and coherent to the branding plan of the campaign.

The design is clean and pleasant. However I have seen conflicts in the color schematics of other pieces of his campaign. This shouldn't be a big problem for the campaign because the public hasn't been exposed enough to either for there to be a branding confusion as seen with Bill Brown's change last spring.

GRADE B+

http://adammildredforfortwayne.com/

An Overview of Campaign Websites

Campaign websites must adhere to these rules in order to be effective.

• People should be able to communicate with the campaign through the website
• The campaign must be able to show who the candidate is (not just their name)
• The campaign must express its platform/ issue positions. This is the most important purpose of the website
• It must be easy to navigate
• Design should be clean and coherent to the branding plan of the campaign

These are the criteria we will use this year in our reviews.