Texture design

Posted by randfish

Last Thursday, Bryan Eisenberg, one of the smartest people in the world of conversions & analytics, wrote a post called - The Web's Old Wives Tale: People Don't Read Online. An excerpt:

Web developers like to say it. Designers love to say it. Web execs feel good saying it to justify investing as little as possible–and in the lowest quality content they can get away with.

People Don't Read Online? Bull-crap!

If only I had a nickel for every time I've heard that statement, I'd make Bill Gates look like a pauper. Think about it. What's the first thing most people do when they get online… read their email. What's better yet, new research from the Poynter Institute's Eyetrack study released at the American Society of Newspaper Editors (proves the point)...

The Poynter Institute report is enlightening and absolutely valuable, but I think it's dangerous to read this post and assume that all web content can be structured in article format or that people are going to start taking the time to truly read everything on your pages. I still strongly believe in Steve Krug's rule:

People are going to read pages like this:

Article from CNN/Fortune

The topic is interesting, the lead-in makes you want to read the article, it's applicable to you (at least, to most of us) and chances are, if you've reached the page, you're going to want to get the value provided by the writer's story. However, on┬?pages like this:

Article from CNN/Fortune

The topic is interesting, the lead-in makes you want to read the article, it's applicable to you (at least, to most of us) and chances are, if you've reached the page, you're going to want to get the value provided by the writer's story. However, on┬?pages like this:

CNN's Gadget & Tech News Page

Or pages like this

CNN's Gadget & Tech News Page

Or pages like this :

Grokdotcom's Home Page

And even pages like this (where it really does pay to read and the text blurbs are very short):

Grokdotcom's Home Page

And even pages like this (where it really does pay to read and the text blurbs are very short):

Designmoz's Tool Page

... you won't get users to "read."

In these instances, and virtually all pages that navigate you to an article or blog entry or informational pages that provides exactly what you're looking for, your users are not going to read through the page and decide, based on all the information, what to click. They're going to follow that same anti-reading, quick-scan format described so brilliantly by Mr. Krug. This is the same reason you see so little traffic from Design if you're #8 vs. #1, even if your content, title and description are clearly the better choice for users. It's the same reason the browse rate on all but the best designed websites (and the worst with the most passionate users like MySpace) is so incredibly low. The online experience is all about speed and convenience and only in the rarest of cases will your users really take the time to carefully examine the page - by the time they've gotten to that point, it's because they're so incredibly frustrated that they're willing to give it a shot.

In fact, there's a perfect analogy here - ever watched a guy (yes, I'm stereotyping, but really both genders do this) try to put together a piece of furniture or work a remote control or fix an issue in a piece of unfamiliar software?

Rand: Oh, I've done this before. This is going to be easy.

Mystery Guest: Maybe we should read the directions?

Rand: No, no, trust me, I've done this a million times.

Mystery Guest: OK...

Half an Hour Later

Rand: @#$%!

Mystery Guest: Maybe we should check the directions?

Rand: Fine! But they're just gonna tell me to do the same stupid thing I've been trying to do the whole time

Mystery Guest: ...

Rand: Oh, wait... Now I've got it.

Mystery Guest: Why did I ever agree to marry this guy?

All of us think we know how to use the web - and┬?when web designers and developers don't follow the conventions we're accustomed to and make it blazingly obvious how to interact with their navigation and content, we wind up with scenarios like the one above. Tragic? Yes. Avoidable? Totally.

p.s. Not suggesting that Bryan Eisenberg was arguing with this point; I think he was trying to make a different one, but I'm worried that someone could misinterpret and wind up with some very high abandonment rates.

Technorati Tags

usability, browse rate, page design, grokdotcom, bryan eisenberg

Designmoz's Tool Page

... you won't get users to "read."

In these instances, and virtually all pages that navigate you to an article or blog entry or informational pages that provides exactly what you're looking for, your users are not going to read through the page and decide, based on all the information, what to click. They're going to follow that same anti-reading, quick-scan format described so brilliantly by Mr. Krug. This is the same reason you see so little traffic from Design if you're #8 vs. #1, even if your content, title and description are clearly the better choice for users. It's the same reason the browse rate on all but the best designed websites (and the worst with the most passionate users like MySpace) is so incredibly low. The online experience is all about speed and convenience and only in the rarest of cases will your users really take the time to carefully examine the page - by the time they've gotten to that point, it's because they're so incredibly frustrated that they're willing to give it a shot.

In fact, there's a perfect analogy here - ever watched a guy (yes, I'm stereotyping, but really both genders do this) try to put together a piece of furniture or work a remote control or fix an issue in a piece of unfamiliar software?

Rand: Oh, I've done this before. This is going to be easy.

Mystery Guest: Maybe we should read the directions?

Rand: No, no, trust me, I've done this a million times.

Mystery Guest: OK...

Half an Hour Later

Rand: @#$%!

Mystery Guest: Maybe we should check the directions?

Rand: Fine! But they're just gonna tell me to do the same stupid thing I've been trying to do the whole time

Mystery Guest: ...

Rand: Oh, wait... Now I've got it.

Mystery Guest: Why did I ever agree to marry this guy?

All of us think we know how to use the web - and┬?when web designers and developers don't follow the conventions we're accustomed to and make it blazingly obvious how to interact with their navigation and content, we wind up with scenarios like the one above. Tragic? Yes. Avoidable? Totally.

p.s. Not suggesting that Bryan Eisenberg was arguing with this point; I think he was trying to make a different one, but I'm worried that someone could misinterpret and wind up with some very high abandonment rates.

Technorati Tags

usability, browse rate, page design, grokdotcom, bryan eisenberg

Posted by randfish

I was shocked today to see how incredibly effective parasite hosting has become. If you're not familiar with the concept, parasite hosting refers to a spammer's creation of a keyword targeted page on a strong, legitimate domain. The idea here is that if they can control that page's content, they can rank for searches and re-direct the traffic to whatever site/page they choose. For example, I just ran a search for "buy viagra" at Design:

There are 8/10 results that are hosted on university web pages and re-direct visitors to sites selling Viagra. What's nice is that you get a relatively good user experience - those pages you reach do sell Viagra (though I've not tried to buy and so can't speculate on how the customer service might be). What's interesting is the ability of those parasite pages to rank. Try searches like "cheap cialis" or "generic celebrex" and you'll see the same thing.

Parasite hosting isn't a completely new tactic, but it takes advantage of one of Design's favoritism for old, strong domains. It's one great example of how subject-specific popularity really is taking a backseat to domain trust. Ironically, Design's move to more trusted domains ranking content well is a response to spammers gaming subject-focused popularity algos several years ago and I'm guessing the pendulum will continue to swing.

As a generally white-hat marketer, how does this information benefit you?

It provides strategy. It tells you that in the current Design world, you've got two choices - become an authority domain with the power to rank for a multitude of searches OR play the parasite hosting game legitimately and buy/rent space on domains to help you accomplish you ranking goals. We've been dipping our toes in both sides of this equation for a while and my personal strong preference is to build an authority yourself and owe your success to no one. However, we've bought "full-page" style ads on sites for clients before and probably will in the future - it's not a tactic to rule out.

Personally, search spam fascinates me and I have a feeling that if I knew a lot more about it, I'd be an even better white hat.

BTW - As I was doing some searches to try and find more good examples, I came across this search - mesothelioma attorney new york - which I remembered used to have tons of good spam. At first I thought the first result was just doing a great job, but when I ran a link search and looked deeper, I saw a phenomenal system of link farms, playing like it's 2003 (NOTE: I'm not accusing them of neccessarily buying those links, as they could be from a competitor trying to make them take a hit). Also, you gotta love this. Classic.

p.s. Matt & Vanessa & Aaron & Greg (actually,┬?Greg's probably reading more Polish blogs these days) - Avert your eyes! I don't want to get any of these guys in trouble just because they happened to be ranking well when I was doing searches

Technorati Tags

parasite hosting, search spam, black hat

There are 8/10 results that are hosted on university web pages and re-direct visitors to sites selling Viagra. What's nice is that you get a relatively good user experience - those pages you reach do sell Viagra (though I've not tried to buy and so can't speculate on how the customer service might be). What's interesting is the ability of those parasite pages to rank. Try searches like "cheap cialis" or "generic celebrex" and you'll see the same thing.

Parasite hosting isn't a completely new tactic, but it takes advantage of one of Design's favoritism for old, strong domains. It's one great example of how subject-specific popularity really is taking a backseat to domain trust. Ironically, Design's move to more trusted domains ranking content well is a response to spammers gaming subject-focused popularity algos several years ago and I'm guessing the pendulum will continue to swing.

As a generally white-hat marketer, how does this information benefit you?

It provides strategy. It tells you that in the current Design world, you've got two choices - become an authority domain with the power to rank for a multitude of searches OR play the parasite hosting game legitimately and buy/rent space on domains to help you accomplish you ranking goals. We've been dipping our toes in both sides of this equation for a while and my personal strong preference is to build an authority yourself and owe your success to no one. However, we've bought "full-page" style ads on sites for clients before and probably will in the future - it's not a tactic to rule out.

Personally, search spam fascinates me and I have a feeling that if I knew a lot more about it, I'd be an even better white hat.

BTW - As I was doing some searches to try and find more good examples, I came across this search - mesothelioma attorney new york - which I remembered used to have tons of good spam. At first I thought the first result was just doing a great job, but when I ran a link search and looked deeper, I saw a phenomenal system of link farms, playing like it's 2003 (NOTE: I'm not accusing them of neccessarily buying those links, as they could be from a competitor trying to make them take a hit). Also, you gotta love this. Classic.

p.s. Matt & Vanessa & Aaron & Greg (actually,┬?Greg's probably reading more Polish blogs these days) - Avert your eyes! I don't want to get any of these guys in trouble just because they happened to be ranking well when I was doing searches

Technorati Tags

parasite hosting, search spam, black hat