In every event is an opportunity to learn something.
Seth Godin was kind enough to present us with an ideal opportunity to learn from one website’s mistakes.
You could probably head over to Web Pages That Suck and find a lot of websites to learn from, but there is a very important lesson to be learned from Follow The Frog.
The screenshot provided by Seth clearly shows that Follow The Frog is advertising using premium Google AdWords. They are spending money.
There is nothing wrong with spending money. In some situations, it’s the only viable means to an end.
But, the face of the internet is changing. New technologies are emerging and it’s important to take that into account when you’re planning your online campaigns.
Follow The Frog does not render properly in Firefox, Mozilla, Safari, or Netscape. They are effectively turning a blind eye to 20% of their potential visitors, and possibly annoying the other 80%.
- Illegible. Because of the rendering problems, the website is completely unreadable in my primary browser.
- Flash. I’ve seen worse Flash presentations, but since the entire Follow The Frog website is done in Flash, it’s hard not to critique it. Bluntly, it looks low budget (and not in a good way).
- Sound. My poor cat, who happened to be laying just behind the laptop, jumped up with a heart stopping fear when the home page finished loading. A frog splish splashing across the screen, loudly, with no warning and no way to quickly disable it.
- No choice. Follow The Frog feeds you the HTML or Flash version based on your browser’s capabilities. However, they do not present you with the option to choose your preferred version. Not everyone is so enamoured with Flash.
- Entrapment. Once you click through to the site, your browser’s back button is effectively disabled. The only other option (for a number web users) is to click on the close button.
If you are planning to spend money marketing your site, make sure it is optimized for the best possible ROI.
- Don’t skimp on design. Websites are judged in the blink of an eye.
- Take the time to check for cross-browser compatibility.
- Limit the use of sounds and make it easy to disable should you choose not to accept that advice. (The only websites that should have sound playing on arrival are musicians and some other entertainers.)
- Always keep your visitors in mind. Go the extra mile to make your website accessible and user friendly.
