Search Engine Tigers

Since other sites have critiqued the candidates sites, and their social media strategies, I thought I’d come in from another direction and look at what’s ranking for certain campaign 2008 terms on Google.

First up is “President 2008“. Ignoring Wikipedia, and other informational, non-candidate sites, here are the 5 names that display in the top 10.

1. Christopher Walken
2. Mike Gravel
3. Hillary Clinton
4. General Zod
5. Mitt Romney

So out of the 5 ‘people’ listed, one is a fictional character (no, not Mike Gravel, General Zod), and one an actor who, unlike Fred Thompson, isn’t running.

How about if we amend the search to include the word ‘for’? So now the keyword is “for president 2008“, every candidate should have that on their website, shouldn’t they? Well, there are many of the same people in the top 10 as in the above (which you’d expect with the addition of one word), plus a few more:

1. Christopher Walken
2. General Zod
3. Hillary Clinton
4. Mike Gravel
5. John Kerry
6. Macguyver
7. Mitt Romney
8. Mark Warner

What about PPC? Well for both of those results – the only candidate running ads is Bill Richardson, which is a great idea given that his site doesn’t show up organically for those searches.

Lets go partisan. “Democratic Candidate for President“. Page 1 is all news & opinion sites, the first candidate site that displays is in the 11th spot… and which candidate is the one that ranks highest out of all candidates for “Democratic Candidate for President”? Yep, Republican Mitt Romney, followed by Republican Michael Charles Smith, Republican Jim Mitchell, Republican Tom Tancredo, and Republican Ron Paul. The first actual campaign site for a Democrat for that phrase is Joe Biden in 49th position.

How about “Republican Candidate for President“? Mitt Romney and Michael Charles Smith show up on page 1, and Jim Mitchell and Tom Tancredo on page 2.

So where are the Democrats? Where are the big candidates? Hillary? Obama? Edwards? Let’s try “Presidential Campaign 2008” and see if that works out better for them… Well there’s only one candidate website on the first page, and that’s Republican Ron Paul. The first mention of the big 3 democrats is Obama’s site in 26th position, 2 behind our old pal Christopher Walken, but 2 ahead of Mitt Romney, and 3 ahead of John McCain. As for Hillary and John Edwards, neither of them are in the top 100 (although a Hillary blog shows up in 55th). Other major candidates – Rudy shows up in 31st, Fred Thompson in 70th, and Chris Dodd in 71st.

So what are the others ranking for? Well, it’s their names, or the searches aboves modified with their names. As far as the generic terms, it really looks like the Republicans are doing a better job, even for Democratic terms. What does this mean as far as the election? Not much, The only ‘big’ candidate ranking well for any of these terms was Mitt Romney, not ranking for these terms doesn’t really seem to have hurt Hillary, Obama, etc…

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