When it comes to who’s paying attention to perceived frontrunners Rudy Giuliani, Fred Thompson, and Mitt Romney among the Republican candidates, the trio receives virtually equal visits to their websites. You’ll never guess who trumps them, and a fourth candidate, easily.
We have fun playing with Compete and its ability to present snapshots of web traffic data that can be compared with each other. Since Doug Caverly looked at Democrats and Google Trends, I thought I’d check out the elephant side of the political circus.
The web traffic for Giuliani, Thompson, and Romney doesn’t look very exciting. Each of the trio tops 108,000 visitors by a small margin for November 2007. Thompson enjoyed a spike upon announcing his candidacy, but has since settled into the pack of web interest.
One might guess John McCain’s traffic would reflect a dropoff in interest as he has suffered from woeful fundraising and the need to make some cutbacks in his campaigning. One would guess correctly, as his visits in November hovered around 92,000.
Add up the monthly traffic for that foursome, and about 420,000 people have expressed interest in their campaigns. Then we have some fun and toss Ron Paul into the mix.
Paul’s site drew over 496,000 in November. His site traffic began to rise from June through September. After that, I’m surprised a Game Over sign didn’t light up on the other candidates’ sites, as about 350,000 visitors arrived at Paul’s site in October, on the way to November’s figure.
How that translates to the real world won’t even be hinted at until the primary season begins in 2008. The Republican machine could be astonished if Paul’s web interest converts into votes, but considering how McCain once challenged George W. Bush before being knocked back, Paul’s campaign may end up being noteworthy for its dynamic online activity.
