Vote for the best US Presidential candidate online media room

UPDATE - November 13, 2007

I was contacted by Matt Browner-Hamlin, the Internet Communications Coordinator for US presidential candidate Chris Dodd, who encouraged me to check out his site for inclusion in this post. I agree with Matt – the site is clean and easy to navigate. Thanks also to Kelly Monaghan who first commented on the Dodd site.

Chris Dodd

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ORIGINAL POST

The online media room (sometimes called a press room or press page) is the part of your organization's Web site that you create specifically for the media. In some organizations it is simply a list of news releases with contact information for the organization's PR person. But many companies and nonprofits have elaborate online media rooms with a great deal of information available in many different formats: audio, video, photos, news releases, background information, financial data, and much more.

I've always said that the online media room is a great front door for your organization, not just for the media, but for your buyers too. And the online media room is terrific (and free) search engine marketing tool.

So now that the US Presidential candidates are in full bluster, wouldn’t it be fun to take a look at their online media rooms (in a non-political way) and vote for the best?

In general, I think the candidates have done a great job in putting their online media rooms together. What a huge difference from just four years ago! These media rooms help voters as well as the media.

Here are some of the better known candidates' online media rooms in alphabetical order by last name:

Hillary Clinton

John Edwards

Rudy Giullani

Dennis Kucinich

John McCain

Barack Obama

Fred Thompson

OK, my vote goes to John Edwards online media room. He has multi-media content and he recognizes the importance of bloggers. Second best in my opinion is John McCain followed by Barack Obama.

What do you think? (Remember, this is not a political vote. It is just for the online media room). Feel free to do a "write in" for a media room of another candidate not mentioned here (but please include a link).

Tip of the hat to Vince Bank for suggesting this. Check out Vince's post where he goes into much more detailed analysis of the candidates' media rooms and also see his grades for each.

All organizations can learn by checking out the candidates' online media rooms. Imagine if your company's online media room looked like these? Would your business improve?

Comments

[Lucy]

What a very interesting subject ...

I'm inclined to agree with you - John Edwards' media room is much more 'social' than the others, and I like the way he has an RSS central, pulling all the feeds together in one place without forcing the reader to accept everything indiscrimately. He also has a helpful Technical Corner to explain things like podcasts and vlogs. (And I like the categories in his blog).

I love the 'look' of the McCain site, though the Media Kit could contain a lot more than simply photos.

Neither of these two sites is available in more than one language (unlike the Obama site and the Clinton site), which I think is a wasted opportunity.

The Obama site I discarded very quickly, though seeing how positive you were, I went back and looked again ... I still think he should create a proper media room, rather than put everything at secondary level in the navigation.

But he does have a social element, and both he and Clinton enable the visitor to create a blog. At the Edwards site, you can only create a fundraising page. I wonder what happens to "anti" posts placed on the Obama/Clinton sites? Do you suppose someone has overall editorial responsibility, and reads everything?

The rest are definitely also rans.

So I suppose my vote goes to the Edwards Media Room. Shame I don't have a real vote (I'm not a US citizen) ...

[Robert McIntosh]

I remember what you said David in your 'New Rules of PR' book that online really reduces the information distribution channel - content right in the reader's PC. It's empowering to note that the average reader gets this information the same time the news organizations do - so we can form our own opinions with the same content.
I like John Edwards - simple, easy to navigate, followed by Hillary's. But since I'm from Canada I can't vote, so it really is just observation.
Keep up the amazing work you do...
robmc

[David Meerman Scott]

Thanks Lucy and Robert,

My wife is a Japanese citizen so I know what you mean about not having a vote. Even though she pays taxes here in the US, she cannot choose the country's leaders.

Cheers, David

[Sarah]

Last month, WIRED Magazine ran a comparison of six candidates' websites: http://www.wired.com/politics/law/magazine/15-11/st_campaignsites

It's about their total online efforts (not just media rooms), but the piece does a nice job getting across the message that reaching an internet audience is very important in campaigns these days.

It's also a fun read and brings up an interesting issue: Will the candidates have the smarts to keep up their internet presence after the primaries?

[Kelly Monaghan]

Hey, what about Connecticut's favorite son, Chris Dodd?

http://chrisdodd.com/media

I give it points for its clean, uncluttered look, which could be a way of saying there's not enough there.

A shame, too, that it's not better integrated with the Dodd blog, run by Matt Browner-Hamlin, one of the best political bloggers in the business. Matt cut his teeth at Connecticut's My Left Nutmeg blog, widely credited with helping propel Ned Lamont to victory in the Dem primary over Lieberman.

http://chrisdodd.com/blog

[Karley Jones]

I think John Edwards should be president. He hs the best plan for Global Warming, and the most reason and understanding of the people in this country!!VOTE FOR JOHN EDWARDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Ciara Price]

JOHN EWDARDS!!!!!!I think John has all his ideas ready for action and yes understands the problems all of them and is the best for the Climate crisis.

[keith]

What do I think? I think a discussion about the current candidates and their use of the Internet is ridiculous if it excludes Ron Paul.

[Matt]

Why is Ron Paul not on this list?