I think the main issue people need to go out and vote. We were told voting was up 15% from last year... but if we assume the AHA is only 40,000 members then there was only a 4% turnout for the vote. The 3 of us are the ones I saw that were putting ourselves out there the most in most of the homebrew forums. Name recognition plays a big role and I guess we don't have that. I will say I was surprised Martin didn't win last year and I would be even more surprised if he didn't win this year since his name has been out there a lot more this past year.
I think most people voted based on the candidate's posted statements not their name recognition on various homebrewing forums. I'm sorry you all didn't win and I know it's tough to put yourself out there like that, but there were also a lot of candidates to select from and the statements was how I think most people made their decisions.
I was really impressed that the vast majority of candidates put together well thought out and constructive statements. It made it difficult for myself to whittle the list of candidates down to a final group for voting.
If it is at all helpful, I researched each candidate as best I could and looked for three traits:
1) Some kind of management/executive committee style experience that was applicable to the AHA. It didn't have to major, just needed to demonstrate that the candidate had worked in a committee before and could do so again.
2) At least one specific recommendation on a way to improve the AHA - things like financial disclosure reports, improvements to the NHC, improvements to member benefits, etc. It didn't have to go into details, but I wanted to see a candidate who was running and wanted to improve/change something.
3) This last one is subjective, but someone who is affiliated with the BJCP as a judge. To me that shows a person is willing to go beyond just being a homebrewer and make the effort to get involved with competitions. Generally, BJCP judges are usually better brewers than non-BJCP judges (here comes the flak!!) and have insight on how competitions are run and can be improved on. I think the relationship with AHA/BJCP is something that can be beneficial for both groups and I'd like to see them work together more.
Anyway, that's what I looked for in a candidate. Obviously everyone votes differently, and I'm not going to say who I did or did not vote for. I hope that is somewhat constructive and again, I'm sorry that you all didn't win. I think you all would have done great and would have been great assets to the AHA.