Skip to Content
Home ยป Blog

Blog

Syndicate content
Digital Engagement Platform: MittRomney.com

Thank you America.  

Thank you Mitt Romney.

What a year.  The election is over and I’m very pleased to be able to announce that OHO Interactive was the lead interactive firm that powered MittRomney.com and all of the digital, social and mobile properties for the Romney-Ryan ticket.  While OHO isn’t a political firm, we are passionate about digital user engagement and are amazed at the enormous opportunity we’ve had to integrate the most cutting-edge technologies into a single digital platform: web, social, mobile, commerce, and data.

<!--break-->

Inauspicious Beginnings

In November 2011, early in the primary season, I got a call from a start-up running a Drupal website looking for some help.  We work well with start-ups – so I went to meet with them.  I found great people, lots of energy, big ideas, enormous passion and limited resources to achieve their goals.  There was one twist, this start-up was a small band of committed folks who wanted to elect the next President of the United States – and believed the Internet was the way to do it.  We started immediately working on a few small projects.

Through the Primaries – Build a Digital Team

In February, OHO Interactive became the lead interactive agency for the campaign taking over project management, development and hosting management for MittRomney.com.  In May, the campaign moved from primary mode to the national presidential campaign. We were asked to build the digital team – from scratch – in 45 days. And we did.  We assembled a complete in-house agency of over 30 people and began work on the most advanced digital engagement platform ever developed by a Republican candidate.

The Most Innovative and Complete Cloud Platform – in 5 Months

Our team along with our partners built an all-inclusive, high-performance, multi-channel digital platform that connected front to back:  websites, Drupal, Mobile, Apps, Social Media, Facebook, Salesforce, Fundraising, Data warehouse and much more. 

A few highlight and results:

  • Over $200 million dollars raised online
  • 43,000 peak simultaneous users
  • 30+ digital properties and apps
  • 35,000+ hours of development
  • Numerous new technology providers
  • All cloud based, and a fantastic team! 

Lessons Learned

There is more to this story. There are many lessons from this forefront of digital innovation that can be applied far beyond the political realm.  I’m looking forward to sharing more soon.

Ed Hastings
Nov 09, 2012
Drupal Development, e-commerce, Email Marketing, enterprise web CMS, Facebook, Marketing, marketing automation platforms, Search Engine Marketing, Social Media, Web Application
Creating Web Applications People Love to Use

On Saturday April 2nd, I’ll be presenting at Product Camp Boston at the Microsoft NERD Center, talking to product managers about how to make their web applications as easy and seamless to use as popular consumer web applications.

Why do you need a love-able app? B2B has gone consumer

As we’ve seen in our work with the publisher Elsevier, there can be resistance within an organization to using a new app if there’s a perception that it’s going to be clunky and unfriendly —and, let’s face it, there are a lot of B2B apps that are just that. Today, B2B users now have higher expectations for web applications, more in line with what they’re seeing in their consumer applications and products, with brands like Apple and Amazon setting a reference point of great quality and functionality.

Solve a Really Hard Problem, Simply

So how do you provide your end-users with an experience that’s more akin to Apple’s than to the typical B2B web application? Lessons from our project for Elsevier provide important insights. We focused on what Apple does right—anticipating consumer and user needs – and developed a system that solves a few key pain points with grace and simplicity. By anticipating end users’ real needs, we provided them with a solution that has only the features they need to get their jobs done.  The result is a highly functional, easy-to-use app that is streamlining the book authoring process.

 

Tips for Making Your Web Application Love-able

Designing great, usable apps is a mindset that requires thinking about apps as a user experience, not just a final product. Some other ways we create apps that your people look forward to using:

  • Focus on the whole experience, not just the core product. The pre-experience and post-experience are important, too. Think of the ways Apple products are presented, making you want to use them, from the store to the box.
  • Think in terms of good customer service to create a positive experience throughout the whole engagement.
  • Create expectation around a product—remember that how people come away feeling about you is what distinguishes an everyday app from one that truly resonates with users.
  • The payoff in providing great apps people can’t wait to use is higher adoption, with a much less steep learning curve.
 
April 2, 2011
8:00 to 4:00
Microsoft NERD Center
1 Memorial Drive
Cambridge, MA
 

Did you miss ProductCamp this year? Join us on May 5 for a webinar based on this talk. 

Jason Smith
Mar 28, 2011
Design, PCamp Boston, Usability, Web 2.0, Web Application
World Wildlife Fund Project Highlighted in "Nature"

Our project with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) to develop a mapping application for use in developing countries was highlighted by the science journal Nature.

Read the article in Nature

The site will allow users to create spatial data and records for development projects. The site will have a strong community component that will allow users to collaborate and refine the data. The site will be built using Acquia Drupal and the Google Maps API 3. It is expected to launch in late spring 2010.

Jason Smith
Dec 04, 2009
Acquia, Drupal, Web 2.0, Web Application
MIT Media Lab Selects OHO for Scratch-Ed Teacher Portal

The Scratch project at the MIT Media Lab has selected OHO to develop a new community web site for educators. Scratch is a new programming language that enables people to easily construct a wide variety of interactive projects. These projects can be shared on the Scratch site. It is focused on helping young people age 8 and up develop mathematical, computational, reasoning and problem solving skills.
The new web site will provide a dedicated space for teachers and educators to collaborate, share curriculum, and develop a virtual network. It will be developed using the open-source CMS Drupal.
Scratch software can be downloaded here: http://scratch.mit.edu

OHO Newsletter
Mar 02, 2009
Education, MIT, Social Networking, Web Application
Asian University For Women

OHO developed an interactive system for handling applications for the Asian University for Women, based in Chittagong Bangladesh. With an integrated user interface, prospects can now complete and submit enrollment and financial aid application online, simplifying administration and streamlining the enrollment process. The Asian University for Women provides higher education opportunities to women throughout Asia and is supported by the Cambridge Massachusetts based Asian University for Women Support Foundation.

OHO Newsletter
Jan 08, 2009
Education, Web Application
Syndicate content