To create a good, fully functional website for your political campaign from the ground up will cost you about $3,000-5,000. Is it worth the money?
Back when I started doing campaigning, I would have said ‘yes, absolutely.’ But times have changed. I recognized the importance of being accessible to the voters through the internet, and I’ve always felt that a website is a must for anyone running for state legislature or mayor and higher offices. But 10-15 years ago, there weren’t really many cheaper options available.
So are political websites worth the money now? Well, I’d say ‘it depends.’ As in, it depends how much money you have raised and plan to raise, it depends how much of your communications strategy relies on online interaction, i.e. social networking, email, etc., and it depends, again, on the office you’re running for. If you’re running for county council – no. City council? Sure, maybe you need a website, if it’s a big city and a competitive district, but not a tricked out, expensive one. Mayor or state legislatures should at least consider the option of a professionally designed website if they are in big or competitive districts. And Congressional and statewide candidates do indeed need to budget for a nice website and someone to for someone to handle it.
There you go! A straight-forward answer! How many times to you search for the ‘cost’ of things, or ‘should I do XYZ’ and all you get is ‘maybe, maybe, maybe’ with no solid information. So there it is – office for office, yes or no, and the factors to consider. You’re welcome!
“But wait, you said there were cheaper options now. What if I’m running for city clerk of BFE, Nowhere, and I still want to do a website?”
No worries! There are a ton of cheap/free options.
- Build your own. You can buy a campaign domain name and get someplace to host it, and build the entire thing yourself using WordPress. That’s how I’ve done this website, and trust me, I am not tech-savvy. I use hostgator to buy domain names and host my website. They are affordable and their customer service seriously kicks ass. I haven’t yet messed up my site so bad that they couldn’t fix it. This option requires time, so I suggest you find some young, tech-savvy whipper-snapper volunteer to do it for you. This person could be the same person to do your social media and email, although usually those jobs require a different ‘type’ of person. Building websites is kind of left-brainy and social media/email is kind of right-brainy. Do what works for your team. Either way, they will be working on most things together.
Cost: $100-$500, depending on how fancy you want to get. - Pre-fab websites. I randomly found this pre-fabricated political website via WordPress one day and I think it’s a fantastic concept. They are clean, they cover all the bases, and they are customizable. If you’re not planning to do tons of crazy online stuff, this is super easy. There are probably more out there if you do a search. It’s essentially the same as the last bullet point, but takes care of the first 20-30 steps of the building process for you.
Cost: $100-$500 - Political Web Consultants. I don’t know much about this area, or how much money would be spent on something like this, but theoretically, because they already have the political knowledge and the infrastructure for political websites, they should be able to do them for 1/2 to 1/3 the cost. For candidates for statewide or Congressional, I’d recommend definitely going this route if you can afford it. I have college buddies that started Prosper Group, who seriously rock at everything internet and are trustworthy folk as well – and that’s saying a lot since I usually don’t trust political consultants at all. They are a couple of the very few good ones. You get what you pay for, so it’s not going to be cheap, but it’ll be fair, and the results will be fantastic.
Cost: $2,000+ (this is definitely a guess – you can always call and ask).
