I’ll be the first to admit my sense of timing is way out of whack. I always tend to overestimate what I can get done in a given period of time. I had planned to have all three of the CA Gov sites done before the primary. Now here we are a month after and I’m just wrapping up Arnold. Micah has been very diligent in hounding me to get this done, so don’t blame him. I just know y’all are eagerly awaiting the next installment of this series (um… yeah… I tell myself that, anyway). Anyway, sorry it has taken so long, but here is a close look at Arnold "The Governator" Schwarzenegger’s site. If you have suggestions for other sites you’d like me to review, feel free to mail them to me at websitereview@kungfuquip.com As a reminder, the six scoring criteria are:
• Appearance
• Communication
• Depth of Content
• Mobilization
• Technology
• Usability
Schwarzenegger is running a multi-million dollar race in the largest state in the country, yet his website, beneath the shiny exterior, has very little to offer. It's a fairly weak offering for a really, really strong candidate.

Appearance (4 of 5)

I really should have put this category last because it really is the most subjective. There are a couple of standard things you can look at – whether the site maximizes the screen real estate, what appears above and below the scroll, etc. – but much of this category falls into a really ambiguous ‘I-know-it-when-I-see-it’ area. This site is especially difficult because I really like what I see above the scroll (the space you see without having to scroll down), but hate it below the scroll. The large central image, the clear horizontal navigation, and the options to get involved are all very obvious, and very inviting. The few minor points I would make regarding the site above the scroll would be the lack of a message component and the lack of a clear finance appeal. As I’ve mentioned in other reviews, I’m a firm believer that the three components of your campaign – message, money and mobilization - should all appear above the scroll. In Arnold’s case, it would be easy enough to fix. They could add message by labeling and linking the images in the Flash to specific content areas - though some of the images are a bit awkward and don’t lend themselves to clear explanations at first glance – “Arnold Supports Guys in White Cowboy Hats” may have something to do with Agriculture policy. It should be clear and link to a policy point. “Arnold Needs a Lot of Pens” may have something to do with education, and should drive you to that issue. The donation option is easy enough to incorporate into the action options on the right, but is noticeably absent. The only other point I would make is the amount of real estate consumed with the top banner. People know who Arnold is, so you don’t need his logo to take up a third of the screen. Shrink that down quite a bit and you can even get some “latest news” above the scroll. Below the scroll is just a mess, but more on that under usability.

Depth of content (3 of 5)

The site excels at content in some areas and falls short in others. I debated whether to score this a three or a four. What impressed me the most is the campaign's full text multi-lingual presentation. My Spanglish is alright, and I speak no Mandarin at all. So the fact that I found very little on one site that I could make out and absolutely nothing on the other pleased me. This is what a site should look like if you're going to do it in other languages. The Record, Vision and Team sections of the site have a lot of depth on Arnold’s past achievements and future plans. However, the amount of material related to the Governor’s agenda and record is somewhat overshadowed by his omissions in a couple of other areas. Despite the fact that some of the copy on issues is sort of vague, you can glean a lot about his ideology from it. It’s meant to appeal to most while saying nothing to all (“The Governor Is Committed to Furthering California's Economic Recovery” --honestly, who would be committed to stopping the recovery and bringing on economic hard times?) but that’s politics and I’ll never change it no matter how many times I point it out. The disappointment with their content really comes in two areas. First, the site actually obscures some of its own appeal. Second, they have taken the top-down philosophy and run with it. Their blog exemplifies both of these problems. It is buried in the navigation. You’d never know they had a blog unless you click on a link labeled “Our Team.” They have also made the unfortunate decision to go the way of the Bush-Cheney ’04 blog and do not allow comments and instead provide sort of a running series of guest commentaries. I’ve made the argument both for and against the inclusion of comments depending on the candidate. Politics is a business where no two races are ever the same and every candidate has different strengths and weaknesses. Arnold is a huge celebrity. There is a certain cult-of-personality that comes with a candidate like that. People want to be around it for good or bad. If you’re not going to give them something else to do, then allow them to be an online echo chamber. This site fails that test, but more on that under mobilization.

Usability (2 of 5)

This site needs help. Their navigation and the area of the page below the scroll is a disaster. Their links to some common navigation options like their blog and donation pages are lost in sub-nav hell. The lower half of the home page is really the biggest problem. It has a tabbed navigation that seems to float in the ether unconnected to anything. When you click on the tabs, everything below them changes, but it’s not obvious from that’s what’s going to happen. They really should break up the space with a different background color or something. Otherwise it just looks odd. The scripting on the tabs also leaves a huge white space at the bottom of the page if you pick certain tabs. That would be ok if it weren’t for the fact that they buried the search option at the bottom of the page. They have a lot of really stupid errors on the site. Most are easy to fix, but nobody has apparently taken the time to fix them. For instance, if you click on the “English” language option from their blog, you don’t end up on an English language version of Arnold’s site. You end up on Kintera’s corporate web page. That’s a dumb problem to have. They also have problems with a lot of the alt tags on the page. If you mouse over most of the images below the scroll on the homepage, they’re all labeled “contribute." This is someone writing lazy code and copying image tags and just changing the image name without addressing the other attributes. That’s fine if you’re some guy hosting your own site out of your garage, but it makes you look careless when you’re a multi-million dollar campaign in America’s largest state.

Technology (.5 of 5)

Kintera has made a name for themselves in the political internet space, but based on Arnold’s offering, I’m not quite sure why. It’s missing even basic functionality that every site should have. For instance, one of the great capabilities of the Internet is the viral nature of content. Things are passed around from person to person instantly via e-mail. This site, however, has none of that. They don’t even have simple “Forward to a Friend” features on their news items. You limit your organic traffic when you don’t allow people to easily pass your content on to others. Also, their action center is weak. Their idea for building support is to contact 10 friends via e-mail. That should be a basic recruitment goal, but what about reaching unregistered or unaffiliated voters? Where is the online voter contact tool? Where is the voter registration link? I imagine they’re getting very little financial support online given that their donation link takes you to a page that says, in essence, “No, really! Are you sure you want to donate?” I clicked on a donate link, I know what that word means, why not take me straight to a contribution form and stop jerking me around? Why would you place an intermediary hurdle between you and my money? Their contribution form is needlessly complex. It requires you to certify that you are either an individual or a business in two different places, and to retype your name twice. Most of that could be automated.

Communication (3 of 5)

Despite having a lot of content, the site, as I mentioned, says a whole lot of nothing. The Flash on the homepage, as I mentioned above, gives no indication of the campaign’s message. It really should reflect the items under the Governor’s vision so you don’t have to go digging around to find it. I gave them a three based on the depth of their issue and record information, but this could have gone lower. One of the odd points I would make about their messaging is the title of some of the coalitions. They have a Hispanic families coalition, but that says to me they could care less about single Hispanics. That’s sort of an odd message to carry. They also have something called the “Remarkable Women for Arnold." Given the allegations that have been made about the Governor’s philandering past, I probably would have stuck to Women for Arnold. Most women I know would take issue with something that labels some as remarkable since it creates a sense that many others are not. That plays into the male-macho ‘dumb broad’ stereotyping that leads to perceptions that you are less than friendly to women.

Mobilization (1 of 5)

The site's almost total lack of ways to interact with the campaign is a disappointment. They allow you to sign up, recruit a couple of friends, and maybe host a party at your house. It’s all pretty much driven by the campaign, and doesn’t allow anyone to take initiative on their own. That’s a terrible disappointment for a guy who is known as a maverick. I would like to see a lot more opportunity to actually help. I’d like to see a way to register my friends to vote, to contact people on my own, outside the campaign structure. I’d also like ways to help fundraise. The GOP really needs to do a much better job of letting our people help us. This site falls seriously short on that front. As I mentioned, the blog is one area where you can invite interaction without much overhead. They have chosen to deny that interaction in arguably the most tech savvy place on the planet. That's a bad idea.

Overall rating (2.25 of 5)

The site looks nice at first passing, but a closer look reveals a lot of flaws. The Governor's an actor, so let me sum this up with a line stolen from the movie Clueless. "[It's] a full-on Monet... From far away, it's ok. But up close, it's a big old mess."