Giuliani Site Visitors Seek Health Content, Clinton's Go for Games and Country Music

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Voters can be capricious, and the Web trails left by people with an early interest in the '08 presidential candidates seem to demonstrate this. In April, visitors to well-trafficked Democratic candidate sites exhibited great interest in highly specialized tech sites, but recently their online tastes have favored subjects like basketball, travel and photography. Folks viewing the official campaign site for Republican candidate Rudy Giuliani also veered away from the online military community sites they'd been frequenting, steering towards auto, senior travel and health content.

Behavioral ad network Tacoda measured how likely visitors to popular campaign sites were to check out certain types of Web content. In May, those visiting Democratic hopeful Hillary Clinton's campaign site were 81 times more likely to view local travel information online than the rest of Web users. Photo hobby sites were also of special interest, attracting HillaryClinton.com visitors 24 times more often than others online.

Fellow Democratic presidential candidate Bill Richardson attracted college hoops fans and legal news junkies in April; visitors to his site were 143 times more likely to view college basketball content and 133 times more apt to read legal news than the rest of Web users. People visiting Barack Obama's official site were 57 times more likely to check out Alaska travel information, and 19 times more likely to view consumer electronics content than the rest of the Web.

Those on Republican Rudy Giuliani's campaign site appeared to have significant concerns about asthma; they were 169 times more likely to view asthma-related content than other Internet users. Visitors to the former NYC mayor's online headquarters also were 47 times more likely to check out information on sports cars. Giuliani's site visitors also were more apt to look at minivan content than the rest of the Web. Of the four candidates' site visitors, only Richardson's did not have auto content listed among the content categories they viewed most.

For a report provided exclusively to ClickZ News, Tacoda pooled ComScore site tracking data with anonymous user data collected from sites in the Tacoda ad network to determine where visitors to official campaign sites go online.

The election is over a year away, and the online behavioral data tracked by Tacoda offer just a glimpse into the interests of those with an early interest in primary candidates. However, the data may defy some stereotypes as to what kinds of people gravitate towards certain candidates.

On the home, family and faith front, Giuliani's site viewers were twice as likely as others online to visit religious Web communities and content geared towards moms of school-aged kids. Obama's and Clinton's site visitors were four times as likely to view religious community content. Those visiting BarackObama.com were also four times more apt to view content for moms of school-aged kids, while Clinton's site viewers were three times as likely to do so. Richardson's site visitors were no more likely than others online to seek out such content.

As for musical tastes, Clinton's site visitors were six times more likely to check out country music content, while visitors to the other three candidates' sites were no more apt to go country than others online. Those on Richardson's site were 15 times more likely to check out current hits, and Obama's site visitors were seven times more likely to check out urban music. Folks on Richardson's and Giuliani's sites were twice as likely to groove on urban music content.

RichardsonForPresident.com's visitors were far more likely to be categorized as business travelers (19 times more so than other Web users), compared to Obama's visitors (five times more likely) and Clinton's and Giuliani's (three times more likely). They were also more apt to view finance-related content -- seven times more likely than the rest of Web users, compared to Obama's visitors (twice as likely) and Clinton's and Giuliani's (three times as likely).

And how's this for a surprising twist: Clinton's site visitors were five times more likely than the rest of Web users to be deemed "Young and Edgy Gamers" by Tacoda, and were also the only ones more likely to check out retirement planning content than others online -- 13 times more.