K Street Cafe

Cross-posted from the Congressional Management Foundation blog

In 1998, the Congressional Management Foundation (CMF) embarked on a ground-breaking research project: to study best practices in congressional websites with the goal of providing Congress with guidance on how to use this emerging technology to improve constituents’ communication with, and understanding of, the institution. Three years later the initiative was boosted by a two-year grant from The Pew Charitable Trusts to create the Congress Online Project, in association with The George Washington University’s Graduate School of Political Management.

The project had an ambitious goal: develop a methodology for evaluating more than 600 congressional personal office, committee and leadership websites. CMF spent a year conducting focus groups with citizens, examining private sector research, and even polling reporters on their expectations when interacting with congressional websites. We then engaged in a thorough assessment process, assigning grades to every website on Capitol Hill. The strategy was: by highlighting the best practices, and playing to politicians’ natural competitiveness with a grading system, Congress would better utilize online communications tools, thereby better serving citizens. (more…)

Cross-posted from Adfero

We’re living in a mobile age. You can’t walk down the street without bumping into someone on their smart phone. And now with the stunningly fast growth in sales for iPads, people are spending less and less time at their actual computers.

Wired magazine famously declared last year that “The Web is Dead.” In the article, Chris Anderson and Michael Wolff argue that we’re abandoning the web for sleeker, simpler services. They say that “these dedicated platforms often just work better or fit better into [people’s] lives (the screen comes to them, they don’t have to go to the screen).” People are no longer interested in seeking. They are interested in getting.

In today’s world, people are constantly on the go. And so naturally, staying connected and receiving information happens on the go as well. In fact, a recent study by Flurry found that people are now spending more time on mobile apps than they are on websites.  Consumers in June spent 74 minutes per day on websites compared with 81 minutes using applications. That’s a growth of 91 percent over the past year. The data speaks for itself: mobile apps are crucial in reaching audiences.

So what does this mean for advocacy? Web sites alone will no longer cut it. Sure, your online Grassroots Action Centers and the Web tools you employ for grassroots action (for example, providing the opportunity for your activists to send emails directly to Congress) should remain part of your overall advocacy strategy. But you have to look beyond the Web now. (more…)

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