But Microsoft, I Want to Spend Money

Microsoft’s adCenter works in Firefox 1.5 but Safari gets this message. Fail.

When Engaging in a Redesign Never Ask "What websites do you like?"

One question asked a lot when websites are being redesigned is "What websites do you like?".

Personally I never ask this question. People will tell you what sites they enjoy personally and more often than not they will include a list of sites that couldn't be further from the industry or brand they represent.

A better question is "What websites do your clients/audience like and why?"

Bing Passes Yahoo! In Most of Our Site Metrics

Image: Bing on a fairly popular site we manage. Comparison is between June and July 2009.

Bing’s passing Yahoo! in most of our site’s metrics. What’s really interesting is how fast it’s risen compared to MSN which used to linger in 3rd place on the same sites.

Bing is worth understanding if you’re in the world of interactive marketing.


Making Bing Previews Work for You

One of the more interesting things Bing does is show a content preview for a website in your search results.

From a really superficial couple of tests it looks like Bing takes the first <h1> tag and the content of a subsequent <p> to build this preview. It also grabs a few links.

This feature gives marketers an opportunity to really tailor their page to get a clickthrough in the search results. It provides a much larger window to expand summary copy normally taken from <meta> descriptions or page content.

When we’re planning sites now we’re going to be giving these two elements special consideration.

Site Wins Fans by Letting Them Play Fashion Designer

One of my clients at Trigger is Orchard Park Shopping Centre in Kelowna. We've positioned them as a fashion forward mall with our "Fresh" creative platform.

I like what Polyvore's done with this site. We try to engage shoppers with social media on the Orchard Park site, usually in the way of a contest.

This is a great alternative to contesting (which can get a little redundant).