Two new usability studies indicate that even though the web plays a more important role than ever in the 2008 election, both McCain and Obama's websites failed to provide intuitive navigation.
Forrester used five criteria in its evaluation: clear labels and menus; legible text; easy-to-read format; priority of content on the homepage; and accessible privacy and security policies. McCain's site passed two of those benchmarks: clear and unique category names and legible text. Obama's site succeeded in one area: straightforward layout making it easy to scan content on the homepage.
Neither site gave priority to the most important information on the homepage, or posted clear privacy and security policies, Forrester concluded.
This confirms a suspicion I've had about the campaigns for some time based on what I see--that they are somewhat reinventing the wheel when it comes to fairly basic elements of navigation. Campaigns are incredibly sophisticated when it comes to offline polling, temperature taking, and focus groups. But I don't think that the campaigns are running surveys on their site to see what is and isn't satisfying potential voters. I'm sure they have clickstream data, but how are they determining which content is of most interest to online visitors? Both of these websites are making daily changes to organization and content: how do they know how to prioritize changes and which improvements will have the biggest impact?
Has anybody seen any kind of vehicle for visitors to provide "voice of voter" feedback on either candidate's website? Any insider info on what kinds of online metrics the campaigns use to guide web development?
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