Media speculation that an early state election will be called in Queensland has been going since before Christmas. I guess if people keep predicting an election is about to be called, they’ll be right eventually.
Certainly the fact that there has been a steady stream of state Labor MPs announcing they will retire at the election reinforces the suspiscion an election announcement by the Premier is imminent. Another sign has been the weekend launch by Premier Anna Bligh of her own Anna4Qld website.
I don’t greatly care when the election is held and I find election date speculation not only tiresome but futile. However, regardless of whether it’s called tomorrow or September, I have to agree with Graham Young in saying Anna Bligh’s website is fairly ordinary, at least at this stage.
I don’t mind stolid, functional websites that give you meaningful information without lots of information. And obviously I like websites which give readers an opportunity to make their own comments. But this one seems heavy on spin and catchphrases, little in the way of solid policy detail with policy ‘plans’ that are little more than media releases, Plus it has a ‘blog’ which doesn’t allow people to leave comments.
No doubt it will still draw traffic and the launch of it generated a reasonable amount of media, which I suppose can be half the aim of these things. But it’s hard to see how it will shift many votes on it’s own.
ELSEWHERE: Derek Barry at Wooly Days, Mark Bahnisch at LP.
2 Comments
Andrew, all the research that has ever been done on politicians web sites says that they don’t convert votes. What they do is provide a venue for your supporters to be managed and enthused. Barack Obama wouldn’t have converted anyone with his site, but he gave his supporters tools so that they could contribute to his campaign, as well as levels of engagement.
Anna’s website doesn’t do any of this either. It doesn’t try too hard for an email address, and I can’t see a “donate” button anywhere.
It’s very antiseptic.
Converting voters isn’t the main function of a politician’s website, although with Australia’s compulsory voting system, I think there is the potential for a website to have small vote increasing effect, compared to the USA – although that would still be maximised if it served to reinforce messages also being put through other media.
There is also the very staid and unexciting, but still important, function a website can play of providing easily accessible information about a candidate/party/policy to someone who is searching for it. I’m not convinced the level of genuinely undecided voters is anywhere near as high as is often claimed, but enabling these to access information is still helpful.
But you’re right – the website in question doesn’t really catch any of these purposes very well – old or new.