ESPN.com - 2009 first major redesign

In the first major redesign of the new year, ESPN.com unveils it’s latest redesign today, after two weeks in “private” Beta for it’s Insider subscribers.  Despite the two week focus group, today’s redesign doesn’t appear noticeably different from the version that launched privately 12/15.  Their stated goals were:

1) less clutter, ostensibly to drive higher engagement (more time spent on site, more pageviews, more traffic) 2) more ad space, to drive higher revenue

Do you think the…

...continue to read "Calling All Sports Fans - ESPN.com gets redesign"

“There’s no reason to become alarmed, and we hope you’ll enjoy the rest of your flight. By the way, is there anyone on board who knows how to fly a plane?”

- Elaine in the movie Airplane

Does looking at an instrumentation panel like this (picture on the left) create feelings of information overload? It does for most non-pilots I know.

Pilots on the other hand, quickly identify the primary flight gauges and navigation equipment.  They know what’s immediately important for flying the…

...continue to read "Too Much Data Vs. Actionable Insight"

Bryan Eisenberg killing web analysts? That is surprising!

More than five years after helping to establish the Web Analytics Association has Bryan finally gone completely nuts?

Has Bryan given up on Web Marketing and Analytics: Process, Talent & Tools?

Has Bryan turned on his friends and now hunting for Avinash, Eric, Jim and all these other analysts?

Ed Wu, the Super Web Analyst, explains it best. You can find out if Bryan Eisenberg is trying to kill web analysts by simply clicking through this link.

...continue to read "Killing Web Analysts"

In the column, “Calling You to Action,” I covered the basics of optimizing the calls to action on your site. The column prompted this comment from “Florida Design” that appears on our blog:

I keep telling people this. I don’t think that optimizing a site for conversion is a “Call to Action” science. It’s a usability science. People aren’t going to click something because its big round and yellow, and says “Click Me”. The reason people click this types of links…

...continue to read "The Sciences and Disciplines of Web Site Optimization"

Don’t miss the 15 year old and still current Calvin & Hobbes on the financial crisis http://bit.ly/RqdH.

Don’t miss my interview with David Szetela on PPC Rockstars today. You’ll hear us discuss the top page and ad elements that every PPC advertiser should test.

What do you think - Is Twitter the Next Second Life? http://tinyurl.com/8nof7j. You may also want to read The State Of The Twittersphere? http://tinyurl.com/6upklq. GigaOm claims Followers Aren’t Really Friends on Twitter. This leads to some of the challenge of…

...continue to read "TheGrok’s Not-To-Miss Links for the Week 12/29/08"