WEBMASTERS READ: Why our petitions don't do so well.

[skids]

...other relatively trivial ones, I decided to get the ones that have help the top slots for a long time (since I've been watching) at petitiononline and look up what web pages were linking directly to them on Google:


Persian Gulf to Remain Persian:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=lang_en&safe=off&c2coff=1&as_qdr=all&q=persian+geographic+petition&btnG=Search

The Marine Shooting:
http://www.google.com/search?as_q=link%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.petitiononline.com%2Fas123%2Fpetition.html&num=10&hl=en&c2coff=1&btnG=Google+Search&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&lr=lang_en&as_ft=i&as_filetype=&as_qdr=all&as_nlo=&as_nhi=&as_occt=any&as_dt=i&as_sitesearch=&safe=off
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=lang_en&safe=off&c2coff=1&as_qdr=all&q=marine+insurgent+petition&btnG=Search

Against Muslim Defamation:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=lang_en&safe=off&c2coff=1&as_qdr=all&q=link%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.petitiononline.com%2Fiecrc786%2Fpetition.html&btnG=Search
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=iecrc786+petition&btnG=Google+Search

Continuation of hunting:
http://www.google.com/search?as_q=tallyh0+petition&num=10&hl=en&c2coff=1&btnG=Google+Search&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&lr=lang_en&as_ft=i&as_filetype=&as_qdr=all&as_nlo=&as_nhi=&as_occt=any&as_dt=i&as_sitesearch=&safe=off

Now let's take a look at our older one, which did OK for a while:
http://www.google.com/search?as_q=link%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.petitiononline.com%2Fuselect%2Fpetition.html&num=10&hl=en&c2coff=1&btnG=Google+Search&as_epq=&as_oq=&as_eq=&lr=lang_en&as_ft=i&as_filetype=&as_qdr=all&as_nlo=&as_nhi=&as_occt=any&as_dt=i&as_sitesearch=&safe=off
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr=lang_en&safe=off&c2coff=1&as_qdr=all&q=uselect+petition&btnG=Search


Just from glossing I'm noticing two things:

1) Petitions that persist have real estate on front pages of organizations or news articles, and they are relatively prominantly placed. Even small organizations may be able to help.

2) Petitions that persist have news stories about the petition, not just comments in other stories like oh, btw, sign this petition.

3) Our older petition has pretty much neither -- references to it are crammed into spools that have long since scrolled off front pages, blog comments, and tiny little areas in sidebars.

IMO, the webmasters on our side need to be aware that if we want our petitions to succeed, it is up to them to give them real estate.

Perhaps if we reach out to some of the less frequently updated election fraud sites, and ask them to do an update with a story about our petitions, we could give ours a much needed boost.

Anyone else have any comments/ideas?

(P.S. more on petitions if you follow my sig link -- a list of many prior to Nov 2 and some that were started after Nov 2, and some from 2000.)

[Roger_Otip]

1. use websites that you can post to

eg. other forums

wiki sites, where you can set up a page for your petition:
the Demopedia
http://www.legjoints.com/AmericanElectionFraud/
http://www.dkosopedia.com/

free webspace:
http://www.geocities.com
http://www.tripod.lycos.com/

the way google works is it looks at how many links there are with a particular title and what they are pointing to, so the more sites you have your links on the higher you will rank in google. it also rates links from high ranking sites higher than links from small sites, but if all you have access to are small sites it takes a lot more work, but can be done. that's how a google search for "miserable failure" comes up with bush's biography.

you can also use google adwords - see http://www.google.com/adwords.html - to push your link to the front page of google, and it can be very cheap, like $1 a day, though the more you pay the more your ad will appear.

[skids]

2. True, but not what I was getting at.

I'm not really talking about how well indexed the petitions are in google. What I'm saying is that we don't give enough "real estate" to the petitions on our "front door" sites.

[Old and In the Way]

3. A petition room might be good place to keep them located.

just a thought...

[skids]

4. I think that's really more the problem than the solution.

They are shoved in rooms, in sidebars, in action lists, in comprehensive link summaries.

They need to be front and center. News doesn't. It can afford to be just a little off to the side, because headlines will grab at you. Petitions won't penetrate to the "Hey, yeah maybe I should sign that now" level unless they are plopped right down in front of the causual browser.

[Cogito ergo doleo]

5. Every site wants traffic

The top of the page is the best real estate there is, and if you did something like a "petition of the week or month," a feature like that could drive traffic to a site. If the site placed a banner up at the top of the page for you, they could place it in an inline frame so it wouldn't bog down loading time (you could even host the page - more on that below). You could post a reminder on DU every week to remember to sign the petition of the week, to help.

Another idea- if you were able to work that out, then when someone clicked the banner they'd end up on a page with links to the different petitions, with your header up at the top so they know they are in the right place. You could have a short summary of the nature of the petitions, then the links.

Banners are typically a difficult size to work with, but you can have an animated graphic if you can't get everything in the space alotted. Also, using an inline frame, you could have text below the graphic, so you could have fresh content every week without having to create a new banner. If you knew the webmaster, you could have the banner page on your server that the webmaster directed into the inline frame. That way you could update it without the webmaster having to.

Hope this helps.

[jamboi]

6. Good research! Glad you pointed it out and I hope webmas. will help n/t

[skids]

7. kick n/t