Kenna Dian: Don’t Bother

Intel.com’s latest redesign is like buying an exotic car. It is visually striking, can be fun to drive, and has more bells and whistles than other cars on the road. But going exotic has tradeoffs. Choosing to pass on getting the full options package can leave the driving experience far less exciting than advertised. In fact, it may even break down–always in inconvenient locations. And the unique controls and design that seems edgy and innovative in the beginning quickly become confusing and irritating.

I really want to buy Intel.com’s exotic new design. But in the end, I simply can’t afford the time, effort and resources I need to invest to make it work. Some of my biggest gripes are:

The product content is like a Chinese dinner. There’s a nice selection of information available, but it is difficult to find anything really substantial in a single location.

Too many things that make you go “huh?” This site presents links, link summaries, and even images, that make no sense, are meaningless, or–at best–make the visitor work to know what they’re for.

Content below the fold is often invisible. Design misfires can make the page appear to be only one screen load when in fact there is much more. Unfortunately, this invisible content is some of the most critical for visitors wanting to buy Intel’s products.

All Flash, no pan. One thing quickly becomes apparent while surfing this site. If you don’t have Adobe Flash Player you won’t just have a mediocre experience—you will be missing information.

Marty:  Don’t Bother (with a couple of moments of brilliance)

I hate to say this Kenna, but my vote is split on the new Intel.com Website. On the plus side, this new design does a great job of pushing the whole negative design, smart search, ubiquitous videos, and mega menu balls down the field. It also had more doodads than a gourmet kitchen. On other hand, it’s also the poster child for some design decisions that should send smart teams right back to the drawing board.

When all of these pros and cons were added up and weighted, I ended up on the “Danger Will Robinson” side of the ledger. Here’s three reasons why.

Intel.com joins HP.com at the forefront of a very tricky (and IMHO dangerous) design trend—flexible designs. These layouts adjust to different screen sizes and resolutions so Websites can adapt to a potpourri of different user devices and platforms. The laptop. The desktop. The tablet. The phone.  Instead of designing a Website for each platform—why not use a flexible design that can act as a “one-size-fits-all” solution? Well, one reason is that it doesn’t always work. [There's more on why in the complete review published in our Case Studies Library--see the link below].

The name of this game is Apple, and it plays by its own rules. Here, the problem lies in the fact that Intel.com’s cool new tools rely on Flash—which is a non-starter on Apple devices.  That means Intel.com is about 150 million devices short of a Happy Meal.

This site is harder to crack than Fort Knox.  Intel.com’s new home page is a pluperfect example of a new genre. Visual.  Edgy.  Spare. Out of the norm. Unfortunately, it also seems to operate under the premise that most visitors want to start their journey by searching for the content located inside the site. I don’t know about you, but conducting a “hail Mary” search without any road signs is my activity of last resort.  Sorry Intel. D-

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Other Stuff to do:

Learn about how IBM.com is changing up the rules in the Visions of IBM.com’s grand redesign emerge blog post.

Overall: IBM.com
Usability: IBM.com
Content, Features & Capabilities: HP.com

But the siteIQ eBusiness Index is always about more than just rankings, ratings, and numbers. So what’s the story about what happened over the past 12 months? Here’s the rundown from first place to last:

1. IBM.com lost sole ownership of its first place position–and with that some bragging rights. Although they added another “Best Practice” rating under their belt, they lost three “Good Practice” ratings due to HP.com’s massive site footprint—which only got larger over the past year. Nevertheless, IBM.com still holds its own—albeit by a margin that is half of what it used to be.
2. Believe it or not, HP.com has a lot to crow about. It garnered a first place ranking for Content, Features & Capabilities, making it the most robust enterprise systems site on the siteIQ Index. It also added another “Best Practice” rating in eCommerce, bringing its total up from two to three. However these accolades can’t hide a dismal ranking in site usability, which just happens to be what really counts this year. Just goes to show, just because your site is big doesn’t mean its usable.
3. Not surprisingly, Dell.com spent the last 12 months focused on core marketing and selling requirements: product marketing, online communities, call to action, and eCommerce. This has always been its tactical modus operandi. Overall improvements in corporate marketing areas are also evident—the most notable being a massive increase in its investor relations.
4. Oracle.com added site content and features across every area of the site—except support. Meanwhile usability scores stayed flat. However, the scoring trend shows that Oracle.com tends to do a more with less. In general, areas that had fewer content additions showed stronger usability scores than zones that went through major overhauls.
5. EMC.com’s story of the past year is largely one of treading water. With the exception of its tanking online support scores, all other areas received minor investments in content and features that resulted in minor upticks in its usability scores. Corporate and product marketing areas got the most attention. Corporate blogs made the biggest splash—from being a no-show in 2010 to a score of almost 60% in 2011.
6. In the past 12 months Intel.com introduced the barest glimmer of an eCommerce facility and corporate blogs area. These two additions alone are responsible for virtually all of Intel.com’s scoring increases over the past year. Most other categories registered less than 1% change in content or usability scoring. (1)

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(1) At the time of this post, Intel.com introduced a new Website that had not been launched before the siteIQ eBusiness Index Enterprise Systems evaluations. siteIQ Best Practice Case Studies detailing the Intel.com redesign launch will be available in the Best Practice Case Study Library.

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So what is implied navigation? If you have used a Website you have encountered it. Links that use vague phrases or single words that, within the context of the current page, promises one thing, only to deliver something else. These links often deliver “general purpose” pages that change topics, audiences, or make the visitor start over at the beginning. Let’s see it in action.

Intel.com uses implied navigation on the top level of its global navigation panel (in gray). The first two links are “For Business” and “For Home” users to access the sites optimized for them. Where the “implied” part comes in is the next to links, “Products” and “Support”. If I am in the “For Business” site, I expect that the product and support listings will be for business. Au contraire. These pages are, in fact, catch-alls. They apply to both audiences. The result is a page that doesn’t serve either audience particularly well (although the design does favor business users), requires visitors to start at the beginning to find the product they want, and make them wonder what they will get.

So with implied navigation becoming a necessary evil in minimalist designs, what are Web teams to do?

• Clarity | Be as clear as humanly possible.
• Context | Keep with the audience or topic.
• Architecture | Don’t start at the beginning of the click stream if the link implies the visitor will get a specific product or topic.
• Design | Use innovative designs when a page has to appeal to multiple audiences and design for the least knowledgeable group.
• Opinion | Get an outside eye. It may make sense to you, but that doesn’t mean it makes sense to anyone else.

Need more information about best practice navigation approaches—and who does them?

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I don’t talk about Oracle.com much. In fact, I speak about them so little that one would be lead to believe that I hold a grudge against them. Sure, they unceremoniously erased one of the best enterprise systems sites from the Internet–Sun.com. But, I won’t hold that against them. No, I don’t write about them much for one reason:

My Mother taught me if you don’t have something nice to say about someone, don’t say anything at all.

There’s a litany of issues I have with Oracle.com ranging from design to innovation (or rather a lack thereof). But today, my rant is about Oracle.com’s content.

With communities and social networking becoming a requirement for IT Websites, product and service marketing content is becoming more focused on visitors’ needs. The prose tells them how the company’s products and services will solve their problems and help achieve their business goals. Some connect their technologies and benefits with real-world scenarios that visitors relate to. The best of the best even make it downright engaging to read.

The new message: “It’s all about you.”

Let’s compare this content approach to that on Oracle.com. A review of over twenty hardware and software product pages showed that Oracle’s name is mentioned a whopping 5 times more often than the words “you” or “yours” on a single page*. On some that number increased to over 10 to one. Combine that with page layouts that always begin with essays about “Why Oracle” and articles about its industry leadership, and you only get one message:

“It’s all about Oracle.”

But Oracle is not alone

HP.com also suffers from the “all about me” disease. HP.com’s ratios almost perfectly mirror Oracle.com’s. Product page content often mention HP five times more often than “you”. This increases to 10 to 1 on pages that provide lists of links to its products or related documents. HP.com does have one saving grace. Its page layouts mix up the content so it’s less obvious that HP is tooting its own horn.

The Bottom Line

The fact is people buy products because they have a problem that needs solved—not because the company is (or thinks it is) fabulous. Tout the product. Relate it to visitors’ needs. If they can understand this and it solves their problem, they will buy it.

What to avoid:

• Sentences that begin with the company name: if there is more than one, there is too many
• Listing the company name before actual product names: if visitors are on the company site, they know what company made the product.
• Topics that only speak about the company: this includes “Why [insert company name]?” content that runs more than 3 sentences.

How do the other enterprise systems sites fare?

IBM.com (software and hardware products) | The ratio of the usage of “IBM” to “you” or “yours” was a surprising 1:1 on many IBM Software page. In fact, on some pages the word “you” was used twice as much as “IBM”. IBM.com’s hardware product content does not fare quite as well with a ratio of 3 to 1.

Intel.com Business | The Intel.com site did not fare quite as well as IBM.com. On average Intel’s name was mentioned 3 times more often than the word “you”.

*Navigation panels were not included. Product names and links located in the body of the page were.

I’ve had space on my mind. Not the kind that Stephen Hawking talks about. The kind that’s finally getting the attention of enterprise-class Web design teams.

It is the power of white space—negative space—empty space–the void.

The importance of using white space in Website design isn’t a brand new concept. One can find plenty of blogs and examples on the subject. A couple of IT sites have also tinkered with it over the past few years. Apple.com has mastered it. Intel.com isn’t far behind.

But now the results are in regarding how negative space designs directly enhance usability. This has turned designing with white space from an avant garde concept into a usability requirement.

So what’s so great about negative space? If you aren’t into design or have been too busy with your day job to pay attention, here are the main benefits:

• Pages are easier to scan
• Navigation options are easier to identify
• Visitor response times are quicker
• Content is easier to read

The (hopeful) end result? Better traffic metrics on non-sales content, better time-to-purchase ratios, and happier visitors and customers.

It’s easy for relatively small sites to jump on this design trend, and quickly reap the usability rewards. For large enterprise-class sites where marketing, cajoling, and negotiating are the paths to progress, this transition is going to require some fundamental behavioral shifts – and is likely to be a bumpy (did I say really bumpy?) ride.

Why? Let me count the ways.

Negative space design will severely limit the space available for the mountain of features, marketing manifestos, and grab bag links found on every enterprise-class Website. This, in turn, will require content managers and stakeholders to slash marketing content, keep it on point, and fit into designs that allow visitors to cut to the chase.

Negative space design means that the same number of stakeholders will compete for less space on important pages, and will have to adhere to stricter design guidelines. Global Web organizations will have yet another standard to enforce [yippee!] – plus a cavalcade of aggrieved stakeholders who want to share 500 reasons why they shouldn’t comply.

Barriers aside, negative space is a design trend that cannot be ignored. Its usability benefits are too profound. Its impact on Website design too far reaching. It’s a trend that will revolutionize and define best-practice-class sites over the next 24 months.

Want to learn more about designing with white space? Here are some great sites to peruse about the subject and gain inspiration:

• Whitespace | Great article from A List Apart that defines “white space” in design and provides useful examples.
• Using White Space Effectively in Web Design | A great tutorial from Web Design Tuts on the elements of white space design and how to use them.
• Give me my Web space | Considerations, applications, and words to the wise from Website maven Molly E. Holzschlag
• Finding Information on the Web: Does the Amount of Whitespace Really Matter? | An informative brief about the effects of white space design on Website usability, including user testing results, from the Software Usability Research Laboratory at Wichita State University.

Oracle.com has been the big Kahuna in the enterprise software industry for the past couple of years when it finally slipped past IBM’s Software Group site, which has been stuck in idle since early 2008. Then it decided to change the rules of its own game.

In 2009 Oracle bought Sun Microsystems in a quest to graduate into the business of selling hardware, software & services to the enterprise business set. Along with its red, white and black cap and gown, Oracle now gets to compete with the likes of IBM, HP and Dell. The question is, of course, how well does the combined Oracle.com & Sun.com sites perform against competitors that have been marketing & selling complex products online for well over a decade?

The answer is: not very well.

Oracle.com sets the pace in the software industry

In fact, Oracle.com’s graduation into the enterprise systems set means that it gets to start at the back of the pack. When these tough cookies are the issue, Oracle.com’s only claim to fame comes in the corporate marketing categories (big surprise). Meanwhile, HP.com, IBM.com & Dell.com beat Oracle.com’s product, services and industry marketing hands down. All three blow Oracle.com’s ecommerce off the map.

But now it gets to start at the back of the pack

While these results are likely to set off celebrations in some quarters, there’s a more sobering story here. Oracle.com inherited Sun.com, one of the most usable & effective sites in the IT industry. Rather than working this site’s good and best practices into its own landscape (and learning some invaluable lessons along the way), Oracle.com simply threw out the baby with the bathwater.

The net result is that Oracle.com + Sun.com has ended up to be much less than the sum of their parts – and that’s why Oracle.com gets to start at the back of the pack.

Related Reports: Website Rankings & Ratings: Enterprise Systems Websites, siteIQ Review: Oracle.com.

Related research: The eBusiness Index Report.  If you are a siteIQ client or subscriber, click here.

In my last post, I shared some info about the top five Websites on the siteIQ eBusiness Index. Here’s my interesting surprises and “oops” list:

Symantec.com’s usability ranks second, and the site misses a “Good Practice” rating by a hair.

Juniper.net and Oracle.com complete the usability top five. Of the two, Juniper.net is most likely to move up a slot and knock CA.com off its perch.

Intel.com aced the online recruiting category and is the only four star (the best) in this category. (OK, so most recruiting zones are a big snooze – but we have to give Intel.com chops for its four star performance).

Services marketing continues to be Nortel.com’s claim to fame; HP.com and IBM.com are still second tier contenders.

Juniper.net hits the high note in the communities category – but Cisco.com and Intel.com also operate four star (the best) communities. (This is another way of saying that the new guys are zipping past community pioneers).

If call to action is your bag, look no further than Cisco.com. It is the only call to action “Best Practice” site on the eBusiness Index.

Newegg.com’s e-commerce capabilities puts it with the big boys: Dell.com & HP.com. Newegg ranks third with four stars (the best) and a “Good Practice” nod.

A couple of new entrants on the 2010 eBusiness Index roster did better than expected.

• Brocade.com and EMC.com rank 7^th and 8^th on the usability chart – and finish in the middle of the pack when all of the scores are tallied up (EMC.com ranks 12^th; Brocade ranks 14^th).

• Among the sites that debuted on the Index in 2010, Deloitte.com and SAS.com turned out to be boat anchors. Deloitte finished dead last – and SAS.com debuted in 17^th place (out of 23 Websites).

Related research: The eBusiness Index Report.  If you are a siteIQ client or subscriber, click here.

We’ve mixed up the siteIQ eBusiness Index for 2010. In some cases the decision was based on eliminating Websites that haven’t improved over the past year and don’t provide any good or best practices worth tracking. In other cases, sites have fallen off our list because they don’t exist anymore. That would be EDS.com which was integrated into HP.com — and Sun.com which went off the airwaves last week.

In both cases, these sites are a loss to anyone who cares about good and great practices. Don’t bother to follow them to their new homes. Their presence inside of their new parent’s sites is nothing to write home about.

Here’s some more about the new sites added to our roster – and why we’re singing “auld lang syne” to others. (If you are a siteIQ client you can read more about what we expect from these and other leading sites in 2010 in our new executive brief in the siteIntelligence Research Center).

IBM Software Group (zone): We’ve been evaluating and tracking IBM.com’s software zone for years as part of our custom client programs. This year it’s time for this zone to move onto the eBusiness roster. It should be interesting to see how this aging and oft cluttered design fares against competitors who are adopting new, highly efficient designs and Web 2.0 features that play directly to the B2B buying process. Don’t even get me started about communities — which are a blooming mess (tag: enterprise software)

SAS: We decided to replace Microsoft’s Dynamics zone with SAS.com this year for a simple reason. We’ve been tracking Microsoft’s enterprise software zone for years under the assumption that it would eventually figure out how to sell to large enterprises and step up to equal footing with the big boys. That never happened. This zone has been a step-child on this site from the get-go and it’s essentially invisible today. This year we decided to take off our miner’s helmets and replace this zone with SAS.com.

The case for SAS.com comes more from its industry presence than its Website footprint. It’s a perfectly mediocre site that seems to have missed the memos on Web 2.0 and social media marketing behaviors. If nothing else, it should be interesting to see how it stacks up against the other big boys in the enterprise software industry. If you are looking for a new leader though, I wouldn’t hold my breath. (tag: enterprise software)

EMC.com: EMC.com is new to our roster in 2010 and we’ve put it in the enterprise systems category. It’s a bit of an odd fit, but we think this is the segment that best matches its strategy and focus. Needless to say, EMC.com has come a long way over the past few years and it’s another example of a site that is maximizing Web 2.0 elements and creating standards for high impact designs. From a first blush perspective, it’s a small but mighty site in the spirit of Adobe.com.  It will be interesting to see where the site excels – and where it misses the mark in 2010. (tag: enterprise systems)

Sun.com: Last week, Sun.com went off the airwaves and was stuffed into a few pages on the Oracle.com site. Thus, ends the life of one of the IT industry’s most innovative and useful Websites.

To see why, let’s look at just a few of Sun.com’s industry “firsts.” It pioneered communities on the Web; embraced Web 2.0 when it was just a spec on the horizon; was the first to deploy tab top designs to consolidate content into manageable bites; automatically discounted prices in its (public) ecommerce system based on the customer’s contractual relationship; pioneered dashboards that allowed customers to customize information to their needs: operated the industry’s largest (java.com) and most diverse range of developer portals; and designed the industry’s first contextual search engine that organized results by objective, type, or role. Oh, and one thing else. It did all of this while ranking #1 in usability over the past 6 years.

All in all, a stellar run for the record book. It’s too bad that the company’s business strategy (and the CXOs that ran it) weren’t as effective as this site.

Intel.com: Intel.com is one of the industry’s most interesting studies because it marches to the tune of a truly unique drummer. Instead of marketing Intel’s products and services with sales as the end game, this site is focused on conditioning markets to prefer (and preferably demand) products built on Intel technologies — and then reward companies that sell Intel-based products by driving buyers directly to their Websites or retail stores. In simple terms, Intel.com isn’t chartered to sell Intel’s chips; it’s responsible for making sure that Intel is the buyers’ preferred brand.

From this perspective, Intel.com has always been one of few pure play ‘brand’ Websites. It’s also one of the first sites to effectively harness communities and Web 2.0 behaviors to start a conversation with users and buyers. For these and other reasons, we’re glad to welcome Intel.com to the 2010 eBusiness Index. May the best brand player win.

Brocade.com: Has anyone else noticed that the network systems industry is consolidating like a cardboard box in the rain? If not, spend some quality time looking for a fourth network systems Website (we also evaluate Cisco.com, Nortel.com and Juniper.net twice a year.  that has any best practices and is larger than a newt. After we spent some quality time considering the candidates, we flipped a coin between Brocade.com and Enterasys.com. Brocade.com won the toss.

We’ve got some real hope for Brocade.com in 2010 since it boasts a bevy of Web 2.0 behaviors, uses the same mega-menus as Juniper.net, and operates communities that show some promise. Of course, the devil’s in the details. Stay tuned for the results from our first evaluation which will be available in Q2 2010. (tag: network systems)

Deloitte.com: Deloitte’s inclusion on the 2010 eBusiness Index roster is due, in large part, to EDS.com riding into the sunset. Quite frankly, we’re glad to have a reason to shake up the professional services sites we cover. Most of them have been skating on the innovation and design fronts for too many years.

Deloitte provides a much needed breath of fresh air to our professional services roster. It’s built on a well crafted design and its lively first person voice takes much of the voodoo out of the consulting services conversation. All in all, we expect Deloitte.com to raise the bar for Accenture.com, and especially IBM Global Services. It should be interesting to see how those sites stack up now that there’s a new deputy sheriff in town.  (tag: professional services)

Here’s the rest of the sites we’ll be evaluating in 2010. If you are a siteIQ client, you can read more about these sites’ strengths and challenges in our new executive brief in the siteIntelligence Research Center.

• Adobe.com
• Microsoft.com
• Symantec.com
• CA.com
• Oracle.com
• SAP.com
• Dell.com
• HP.com
• IBM.com
• Cisco.com
• Nortel.com
• Juniper.net
• CDW.com
• Insight.com
• NewEgg.com
• Accenture.com
• IBM Global Services (zone)

What do you think of these sites? Sound off in comments

The new Intel.com allows visitors to navigate into the site using task-based Work and Play metaphors.

The new Intel.com allows visitors to navigate into the site using task-based Work and Play metaphors. Like HP.com, it’s pretty hard to miss the new Intel.com. The changes start with a brand new global page that brings a couple of new wrinkles to the party. Unlike other global home pages that provide a list of country links, Intel.com allows visitors to select their country location and instantly navigate into different parts of the Intel site. Here, Intel.com uses a combined task & audiencing metaphor: Work (read: business), Play (read: consumer and gamers) and About Intel (read: corporate info). Interactive fly-outs provide snippets about what’s in each zone. Add the classic links at the bottom of the page, plus a few others (jobs, RSS, investor relations, press), and you have a simple & easy to use global front door.

The Play Zone Delivers a Marketing Tour de Force

Once inside the site, it’s pretty obvious that the centerpiece of this update is Intel.com’s new “Play” zone, which is optimized for consumers. This zone is the home for Intel’s new “What’s Inside You?” campaign which (like Cisco.com’s very successful Human Network campaign) creates community by encouraging visitors to share their stories online. Here, Intel pulls out all of the stops with beautifully designed interactive graphics and a streamlined registration process.

Intel.com's smartly executed "live action" techniques are a marketing tour de force.

But the real gem in this new zone lies in how Intel.com has truly revolutionized how a site can be used to educate visitors and lead them through the product discovery, selection and shopping processes. To see why, start your journey at http://www.intel.com/en_US/Consumer/Learn/Processors/index.htm or http://www.intel.com/consumer/index.htm.

Forget pages packed full of gnarly lists of Intel processors that only an engineer can understand. Forget technical jabberwocky, boring speeds and feeds, and marketing manifestos. In this zone, Intel.com harnesses the power of interactive videos to tell its story. The landing page starts with a smartly executed video that explains why processors matter (who knew?) and encourages visitors to learn more. This, in turn, leads visitors to interactive videos that align Intel’s processor families by form factor (desktops, notebooks, mobile devices) and by target applications & uses. There’s even a path for visitors who don’t know which way to go.

And what’s the net effect of this video journey? By the time you finish listening and learning, you’ve made enough logical selections to shop for Intel-based products offered by prominent retailers, such as Lenovo, Acer and HP. From start to finish, it’s a 5 minute journey. From an online product marketing perspective, it’s a million miles ahead.

From start to fnish, it’s a 5 minute journey. From an online product marketing perspective, it’s a million miles ahead.

SITEIQ VIEW | Although there’s much, much more to this launch than Intel.com’s savvy use of videos (including some product marketing pages that have all the right stuff), there’s no doubt this is the breakthrough best practice that shouldn’t be missed. Why? Because every IT Website team we work with struggles with the same basic problem: how to lead visitors to the right product based on their technical, application and usage needs. Once they are there, the challenge turns to clearly communicating the company’s value proposition, explaining product benefits, and encouraging visitors to take the next step.

If you look closely at Intel.com’s new best practice, it achieves all of these objectives—plus some. It starts by explaining the company’s value proposition in easy to understand terms; organizes and presents products based on the visitors needs; stresses benefits and capabilities—and then hands the visitor off to retailers to take the next step. Best of all, it achieves these objectives in less than five minutes–and without expecting visitors to wade through a blizzard of links backed by deadly dull marketing prose.

This, of course, brings us to the gazillion dollar question. How likely is it that Intel.com’s best practice will change existing online product marketing rules?  My magic 8 ball says “stay tuned.” There are too many gating factors in play. First, these features are clearly budget busters. If that’s not a problem, one could argue that this technique consumes too much bandwidth, which limits the audience and might make the site appear to run slow (although that hasn’t been a problem with my garden variety high speed connection). It’s also important to consider the impact of these ‘fat’ applications on mobile devices and other Internet appliances—especially in countries where PCs are not the access points of choice. Auto-play videos can also be annoying if visitors pogo-stick around a site (like us). Intel.com’s speaker icon is handy solution, but a cadre of usability gurus will argue (probably with some merit) that auto-play behaviors are a sin.

Whatever the long term outcome, Intel.com gets a huge thumbs up in my book for pushing on the product marketing envelope. Through its savvy videos, it has succeeded in taking a product misunderstood by zillions and has woven it into digital gold. If Intel.com can do this for a piece of silicon that is invisible to users, just think about what the rest of the IT industry could do.