Posterous theme by Cory Watilo

Filed under: marketing

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?"

Making Bing Previews Work for You

Bing-preview

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

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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).