Comments on: Is Your Website Copy More Important Than Your Information Architecture?

By: Architecture vs. Copy « Brandin It

Architecture vs. Copy « Brandin It — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 19:38:54 +0000

[...] Architecture vs. Copy In Uncategorized on December 18, 2009 at 7:38 pm I came across this article: http://www.interleado.com/blog/index.php/2009/06/16/is-your-website-copy-more-important-than-your-in... [...]

By: Jeremiah

Jeremiah — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:57:55 +0000

I have to agree with the first poster: Roseanne Smith. While I understand your analogy, Nike’s site is more of a marketing tool than a sales mechanism.

What you are really showing is the case of a site that is designed for the purpose to generate sales, versus a site that is designed with the purpose to generate a buzz.

Nike, as a brand, obviously doesn’t need their site to sell shoes. It is the same purpose driven reasoning based on desire and distribution of a product that means I can’t buy a Pepsi on their site, or a Wii on Nintendo’s site.

Moving to a model where these companies would sell a high volume directly from their site would put at risk their model of selling to vendors that would need to sell the product at a markup.

By: Peter Cullen

Peter Cullen — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 19:11:23 +0000

@MikeY – Thanks for dropping by – good point about website owners – question is though, how many are swayed by their web designer?

@Andrew – Just noticed we haven’t updated our FAQ page in a while, thanks for the input.

By: Andrew MacLeod

Andrew MacLeod — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 15:17:33 +0000

Peter – I’m a PR who spent 35 years as a journalist/business editor, so I may be a little biased. The gurus always tell us that content is king – and I take that to mean that web pages should be written in a clear and accessible way. Too often that’s not the case.
But the architecture of a website can cause me to click off in a few seconds. Why wouldn’t I when there are dozens of other sites I can move on to?
Biggest bugbear? The site owners who are determined to do absolutely everything online, and go to great pains to hide their telephone details and addresses.
There are times (the majority in fact) when you can’t resolve your problem by scanning the FAQ page, and want a human being to talk to.

By: MikeY

MikeY — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 09:18:49 +0000

Peter:

Thought provoking articles and information such as this is the one main reason I keep coming back to the Web for my higher education. Thank you.

(Note: Although I often wonder whether the addiction is worth it!)

Who is to blame?

I can’t talk about the heavy hitters as you reference. I am a DIY guy trying to teach others what I learned in creating a successful niche for my wife’s Web business.

But, from a mini- and micro-business perspective, it is the Website owner who is ultimately responsible. The qualifying word here is OWNER.

By: Partha

Partha — Thu, 20 Aug 2009 06:06:11 +0000

“Who’s to blame for websites with no/little information architecture – the website owners?…..”

None other than the self-acclaimed heads of business who seem to know everything under the sun, even if they may not not a jack shit!

By: Nita kapadia

Nita kapadia — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 09:31:42 +0000

As a web content writer, i was curious to know your view.What you said sounded very interesting.I’ve written content for
http://www.terraventures.co.in
How do i survey it for traffic?I do not know how much traffic it’s getting.
sincerely,
nita

By: Peter Cullen

Peter Cullen — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 08:12:19 +0000

Hi Rosaenne,

Thanks for the comment. Womens shoes! Obviously only used to make the point!

Not sure what the deal is with Nike, but they definetly have some issues.

I would have thought that in the B2C online retailing market place, having a strong, clear, understandable website is critical to sucess?

By: Roseanne Smith, IIA Membership Manager

Roseanne Smith, IIA Membership Manager — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 09:36:56 +0000

Hi Peter,

A very thought-provoking post. I have to admit one of the thoughts that it is provoking is why you are searching for women’s shoes but I digress…

Having recently attended a workshop on advanced analytics I wonder if it’s possible that part of the issue for Nike is that they are not seeing a return on their investment and therefore the online team are finding it hard to make the case for further investment…? Also Nike’s business model may not rely so much on this kind of direct selling as the sales they will make on the likes of Netaporter etc. But with tweaked architecture and the ability to undercut competitors they could make a killing.

By the way I tweeted this post.

Have a great weekend!
Rosaenne