This document discusses measuring the strength of political candidates' narratives based on an analysis of their websites. It evaluates the websites of Hillary Clinton, Donald Trump, and promises to also review Bernie Sanders and Ted Cruz in part 2. For Hillary Clinton's site, it finds the narrative is subtle and not well presented, scoring 8/32. For Donald Trump's site it finds the main theme is unclear beyond the tagline, but presentation is businesslike, scoring 13/32. Both sites are seen as leaving narrative power untapped. It promotes measuring narrative strength as a way to improve communication of beliefs and stories to audiences.

2. NARRATIVE
STRENGTH IS
MEASURABLE.
CANDIDATES’
WEBSITES
PROVE IT.

3. NARRATIVE
STRENGTH IS
MEASURABLE.
CANDIDATES’
WEBSITES
PROVE IT.
PART1

4. Narratives win hearts and minds.

5. When they’re powerful.

6. But how do you make a narrative
powerful?

7. First you measure.

8. You can measure how
strong your narrative is.
We can use candidates’
websites to demonstrate.

9. For the purposes of
this discussion, we’re
only looking at
candidate websites.
Yes. That’s a big simplification. But we’re
making a point, not a campaign. So far.

10. Oh. You want to know
what a narrative is?
Here are 3 useful
definitions:

11. 1.
A narrative is a
system of beliefs that
effect how you
interpret the meaning
of things.

12. 2.
Your organizational
narrative is the core
of what you believe
and why you matter.

13. 3.
Your narrative is the basis of
the many stories you need
to tell to customers,
prospects, employees.

14. STORY VS NARRATIVE

15. NARRATIVE

16. STORY

17. SO. HOW DO WE
MEASURE NARRATIVE
STRENGTH?

18. WE NEED
SOME
CRITERIA.
SO I’VE
IDENTIFIED
FIVE.

19. PRESENTATION
How well is the
narrative is presented?
Can I find it and follow
it?
Do I want to?
ONE

20. How easy is it to
understand? This can
be the key issue in
complex or technical
narratives.
CLARITY
TWO

21. Does it make me feel
something? Does “it
make sense”? Does it
have supporting
evidence?
RESONANCE
THREE

22. If I see it, and I get it, can I
explain it to someone else?
Do you encourage me to do
that?
SHAREABILITY
FOUR

23. This measures how well your
organization is managing its
narrative internally.
We have no inside knowledge
of the campaigns, so we will
skip this criterion in our
assessments.
ORGANIZATION
FIVE

24. So let’s check out
HillaryClinton.com
with this in mind.
Note, we aren’t evaluating the merits, just the
strength of the narrative.

25. HOW STRONG IS THE NARRATIVE ON
HILLARYCLINTON.COM?

26. This is a simple page designed to
engage existing supporters. “I’m with
her” has morphed into “She’s with us”
in recent days.

27. Scroll down and you
see links to her
“Racial Justice Plan”
and “Economic Plan”
People are probably
interested in those.
Wonder where that
college plan is? Keep
scrolling….

28. The likely next stop is
this page.
Generic text. Generic
image. Generic.
Massive opportunity
to do better.

29. Scroll down to an
Issues List. It’s
alphabetical .
No prioritization,
emotion, vision. No
imagery.
None.

30. There are themes here, however.
A little jiggering could slot all 28
issues into “Justice, Prosperity and
Security”
That would be better.

31. OK. There’s some
vision and substance.
Not very readable.

32. Further down the page. Good
sharing buttons. A deeper,
downloadable paper for nerds like
me to read.

33. FINDINGS

34. The narrative on this site is
subtle and not particularly
well presented. It is hard to
point to the main message
or themes.
It would be challenging to
explain it to someone else.

35. We are surprised by the lack of
interesting imagery or reference to
her massive body of public service
outside of her bio page.
We note a lack of any future
focused theme or attempt to make
an emotional connection with would
be voters.

36. SC
SCORE – 8/32

37. 8/32. That score leaves a lot of
narrative power, a lot of influence
and a lot of impact on the table. This
site is not serving its organization
well. The only candidate site with a lower score was
Jeb2016.com (we archived screenshots)

38. 8/32. But with a clear sense of what
can be done to make it stronger.
This score is both an “As-Is” and a
way forward.

39. If her campaign wanted to improve
that score, they need to build out a
narrative hierarchy and a
presentation strategy.

40. We’ll talk aout this more at the end.

41. First, let’s check out
DonaldJTrump.com
with this in mind.
Note, we aren’t evaluating the merits, just the
strength of the narrative.

42. HOW STRONG IS THE NARRATIVE ON
DONALDJTRUMP.COM?

43. Vague but dramatic tag line.

44. Smirk face. Victory sign. Or maybe a
peace sign?

45. Scroll down. This section changes
frequently. This week it’s about his wins
and anti-Rubio. Trumps site is very much
about Trump.

46. 6 “Positions”. Of all the candidates, this is
the fewest number of issues. It is
challenging to infer his likely position on
other issues. Layout is OK.

47. Positions pages aren’t optimized for
online reading and scanning. Easy to
navigate on right. Yes. The wall is in there.

48. Look hard and you’ll find an Issues page in
addition to the positions page.
These are shorts of Trump speaking to the
camera on hot topics. These are updated
frequently.

49. FINDINGS

50. The main theme of the
home page “Make
America Great Again” is
referred to at the
conclusion of each
Position paper, but not
elsewhere on the site.

51. The presentation is tidy and
businesslike, but not exciting or
engaging, though the issue videos
are dramatic.
His position papers are clear, but
not backed by data or details.

52. There is minimal opportunity to
share and minimal connection to
social, which is surprising given the
strength of the campaign’s social
presence.
Again. We’re not evaluating the
merits here.

53. SCORE – 13/32

54. 13/32. Still leaving a lot on the table.

55. Hard to make recommendations
about DonaldJTrump.com but there
is a clear gap between “Make
America Great” and the other
information presented on the site.

56. Check out Part 2
For BernieSanders.com and TedCruz.org
and a look at what this means for you, your
narrative, and your website.

57. Want to talk about
narratives?
www.narrativebuilders.com
@deb_lavoy
deb@louisonlavoy.com