This is quite a far cry from 2008 when the Obama team dominated the search engines.
For example, I tried both personalized and the anonymous search on Google using the search terms "Obama job plan" and "Obama jobs plan." The official campaign website, http://barackobama.com, did not show on the first page of results!
When I did a Google search for "Romney job plan" and "Romney jobs plan," the official Romney website. http://mittromney.com came up on the top of the first page!
Furthermore, the results for the Obama search featured more negative results lambasting the president's jobs plan compared to the Romney jobs search.
When I searched for a related search query "Obama economic plan," barackobama.com came up only in fourth place in the list of results. However, again the search for "Romney economic plan" had the official campaign website at the very top of the search page.
A search for "Obama tax plan" produced results with the official Obama site near the bottom of the page while "Romney tax plan" had the official Romney site in second place.
The news results on these pages are more favorable for the president possibly indicating his superior press outreach. However, it is uncharacteristic for the official website to appear so low for important queries.
Another important search term "Obamacare" does not turn up either the campaign site or the White House site on the first page. At the very top of the results is an article from Conservapedia, a resource for political conservatives!
If I type in "Obama health care" though, the picture improves favorably with multiple links for both White House and campaign site.
Given the importance of economic issues, though, I think the campaign needs to get moving more on SEO. Many people use the Internet to get most of their information including on major political issues, so they need to be vigilant on what is happening on the online battlefield. For example, try a search for "health care mandate." The results could use a lot of improving. A dedicated SEO team should be able to turn things around fairly quickly.
Young Americans for Obama organized and made calls together in Iowa this week—to join in, sign up to volunteer for an upcoming event near you.
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