The Obama Project

End of all speculations and debates, the result is out ! Obama wins. Sweet ending for massive efforts lasted for several months.

Every one who watched the election campaign will agree that the victory was not just an accident. I would say that it was a very well planned and professionally executed PROJECT.

Extensive use of web technologies and networking techniques were the stunning features of this great project.

 ‘Wired.com’ says “Propelled by internet, Barack Obama wins US presidency !” It is very much true. The focal point of his campaign was his website www.barackobama.com . The site was very professionally designed with solid objectives.

1. Source of information
2. Networking
3. Fundraising

The site is so good looking and the features and content were outstanding! It arranges essential information under easily navigate-able menu structure. It gathers people as followers, volunteers and donators.

Market personality >> Create followers >> Raise fund : This was the tactic used.

I am greatly inspired by the way entire campaign was planned, executed and concluded.

Just check out the MyObama community post sent out few hours before close of the voting:

“Our target today is to make 1,000,000 calls to voters in battleground states before the close of polls tonight. As of 1:00 PM Eastern, we've made 214,187 calls. However, our staff on the ground are telling us that we need to reach the 500,000 call mark by 3:00 PM Eastern Time.”

Follower communities were well connected through his website, were intimated about the local and national campaign events. They were given instructions and specific targets. True project management!

They have engaged "RIGHTNOW” – a leading CRM company to manage increasing number of voter’s calls and e-mails. This was a ‘shift’ in the way political campaigns were managed, by employing a company who manages consumer issues for big corporate. "RIGHTNOW” designed tools for assigning teams and managing (acknowledging, responding, following up..etc) voter communication. FAQ (Obama Answer Center) sections which allow users to find answers to frequently asked questions about Obama. This section had many handy tools like “Search answers” Apart from this there were numerous tools for analysing the data and giving trends. Using these tools the campaigners were able to find the traffic from various constituencies, most used key words and more frequently asked questions.

Apart from this, for online team management they have employed another tool “Central Desktop ”.

CentralDesktop is a web based “Project Collaboration Tool for Teams”

I am sure the “Obama Campaign” is going to be subjected to lots of research & studies on its marketing & project management perspectives !

Links:

http://www.barackobama.com

http://www.centraldesktop.com/ 

http://www.rightnow.com/