Only 500 days remain until Americans choose their next president. This race promises to be the most wide open in a generation and the costliest ever. For all but a couple of the 20+ announced GOP and Democratic candidates, the crusade will end by early February after the results of a tidal wave of primary contests are known.

This past weekend marked the end of the second quarter dash for cash, also known as the money primary. The Democratic front runners have already announced, amassing a combined $61 million for the primaries during Q2 while the leading Republicans are expected to announce a significantly smaller, albeit still sizable, haul over the next day or two.

With changes in campaign finance laws, individuals can contribute a maximum of $2,300 to a candidate for the primaries and another $2,300 for the general election. The key therefore is 1) attracting well connected people (bundlers) who can get their friends and associates to donate and 2) developing an army of supporters through grass roots efforts. The former seemingly plays to the GOP’s strength while Democrats excel at the latter.

The web has become an indispensable tool for the candidates to solicit funds and build their networks of support. Using Compete’s Attention metric (which measures the total time spent on a site as a percentage of the total time spent online by all U.S. internet users), we can judge each candidate’s effectiveness at attracting and retaining visitors to their causes during Q2 and get a glimpse into the campaigns’ end of quarter scrambling to stay competitive.

Let’s compare the field:

Democrats

Highlights:

• Senator Barack Obama’s base-building efforts (reportedly over 110,000 people have contributed online to his campaign since the start of the year) are evident in his lead over rivals in attention. During Q2, Obama’s average daily attention was 44% higher than Senator Hillary Clinton and over twice that of former Senator John Edwards.
• Clinton averaged only 70% of the Obama’s daily attention, but was aided by several spikes in interest throughout the quarter; notably beginning June 19th with the release of her Sopranos-esque video spoof.
• Despite Edward’s efforts to stand out in a crowded field, over the course of the quarter (beginning mid May) this contest shifted markedly to a two-horse race between Clinton and Obama.

Republicans

Highlights:

• Former Governor Mitt Romney parleyed his strong Q1 fundraising and debate performances into increased online support during Q2. The spike in mid May coincides with his “Sign Up America” drive that reportedly netted over 30,000 new supporters in 24 hours. During Q2, Romney’s average daily attention was 45% higher than Senator John McCain and 130% higher than of Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani.
• Giuliani is wisely leveraging his ties on Wall Street to pad his campaign war chest, given that he’s been unable to build much of following online. Giuliani attracted the lowest attention of all of the six leading candidates during Q2. Put in other terms, Obama generated 10 times the online attention of New York City’s former mayor.
• After a miserable Q1, McCain’s campaign continued to struggle to attract a sizable number of supporters during the latest quarter, making yesterday’s bloodletting all the more necessary. Although McCain’s daily attention averaged 60% higher than Guilani’s throughout the entire quarter, McCain and Giuliani attracted nearly identical attention in June. That’s particularly bad news for McCain given the scant attention Giuliani seems to be paying to his grass-roots efforts in addition to McCain’s traditional dependence on grass roots support.

So far at least, Democrats are paying considerably more attention to this race than Republicans given that the combined attention of the top Democratic candidates during Q2 was four times higher than that of the top GOP frontrunners. Former Senator Fred Thompson’s pending entry into race, and the potential for an early McCain exit, ensure that this election will only get more interesting for those with the endurance to stay tuned.

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