Who should be in charge of your web presence?

Who you hire to drive your web presence depends entirely on what you want/need to accomplish.

If you are in the camp of campaign managers who see your web site as akin to a yard sign: "something that doesn't do much good but you have to have because the other side does," you'll probably want someone with strong design skills who you can keep busy on higher priority campaign tasks.

If you understand your web presence can be an online campaign office:

• a place where supporters come to get information and inspiration
  
• a place where undecided voters see info and endorsements that help them decide
  
• and a place for meaningful two-way communication

you'll search for someone who understands how to weave threads of every part of your campaign strategy into your online presence.

Most down-ticket races probably need nothing more than mostly-static content that collects all your campaign info in one (well organized) place, that lets visitors subscribe to your newsletter, and provides a donate button. This type of presence leverages the message work you put into your other campaign materials and probably requires no more than a chunk of time for initial setup and bits and pieces of time to update with press mentions and anything else you want to give broader visibility to.

So think hard about what you want your web presence to accomplish before you decide who to hire.

--Louella Pizzuti