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Shady Advertising Motives or Just Thoughtless Design?
By Jason Sherrill
Posted on Oct 10, 2007
On the NYTimes.com website, they've added a new E*Trade advertisement in a rather questionable location that makes me wonder whether their designers are just careless, or if they're intentionally trying to trick visitors into clicking the ad.
One of the most common website search design practices is to place your "Search", "Go", "Submit" or similar button immediately to the right of your search box. Here are a few examples from well-known sites:
From www.msn.com
From www.yahoo.com
From www.cnn.com
So today I questioned whether the NYTimes.com designers completely missed the mark when deciding to place the E*Trade button advertisement where the "Search" button would normally appear, or if instead it was a profit-motivated decision to intentionally trick visitors into clicking the ad.
How many people instinctively click the E*Trade button simply based on its placement?
Most businesses are looking for ways to monetize their websites, and many are successfully doing it without impacting their site's usability. When deciding where and how to implement ads and other monetization methods on your website, ask yourself if a method will interfere with visitors using the basic elements of your website. If the answer is yes, then you also need to determine how your intrusion will impact your visitor's perception of your website. Some people may forgive you and deal with your decision, but expect that some visitors, people like me, will likely go elsewhere to get the information, product or service they need.
Comments
Looks pretty intentional to me. Shady NY Times. But then again, don't you have to register to even read their articles?
By Donovan Myers
Posted on Oct 7, 2007