Comments on: Vertical space search engine comparison test results

By: Study determines optimal size in pixels for web design » Make You Go Hmm

Study determines optimal size in pixels for web design » Make You Go Hmm — Fri, 27 Oct 2006 17:47:27 +0000

[…] This report reminds me somewhat of my search engine vertical space test. Too often web designers don’t give the content enough room to breathe. Perhaps I’m in a small minority but I’d rather see a site go members-only and stay easy to consume the content than remain ad-supported and a mess of tangled ads with content. How many good content sites can you think of that have ruined themselves by drowning the content with ads? Some sites start out with too many ads, thus severely limiting their chances for being linked and bookmarked by others. […]

By: Make You Go Hmm: » 8 things Microsoft can do in 2006 to better compete against Google search and Adsense

Wed, 28 Dec 2005 17:44:45 +0000

[…] 1. Launch Adcenter for websites worldwide ASAP (no beta invite only garbage). Why can’t I sign up for this and add to our websites now? Why is Adcenter still in pilot status? If this isn’t done in Q1-2006, they can pretty much forget about this doing anything unless their pay structure blows away all competitors. Adsense and YPN are gaining market share that MSN loses every day. Also, please make sure Adcenter works in competing browsers! The newest version of Opera says: “Please Upgrade Your Browser” when navigating here. 2. Make Adcenter a one click install to any and every MSN Spaces blogger who wants it. Google made it painless adding Adsense to every Blogger blog — yes, even splogs sadly — and add they did. 3. Offer how-to guides on how to add Adcenter to every other popular blog software. Google has a bit of Microsoft in them as they release stuff that puts a huge spotlight on their own stuff. Case in point: Google Reader which has a post to blog function that only works with Blogger. Microsoft needs to add similar functions and also use the MetaWeblog API so that users can post to Wordpress, Movable Type, TypePad and other popular blogging platforms. MSN Spaces already allows this, but how about built-in blog integration a la Flock inside Internet Explorer 7? 4. Adcenter API from day one public release with no usage limits or restrictions — yes, even commercial use. Tieing the hands of third party developers isn’t a wise move. Empowering them, however, can lead to some exciting creations. And don’t just make this API .NET-friendly like Microsoft does with everything and forgets that other programming platforms actually exist and developers like. Make sure real world examples exist for competing languages like PHP, Python, Java and Python. 5. Fix the MSN vertical length issues — use less than Google — so that they stop making users scroll in MSN searches. Aesthetically, Google search feels cleaner than MSN, and if they want to start fighting the aesthetic battle they need to clean up the search clutter today, not tomorrow. 6. Close a significant deal with Yahoo or another major internet force. We already know AOL is out, but that leaves other choices. #2 and #3 banding together to fight #1 makes a more formidable #2. A post on MSN Program Manager Ian McAllister’s blog suggests some intriguing deals could be under consideration: At the end of the discussion one of the people I was meeting with threw out a blanket offer to brainstorm other ways in which our companies might work together. He then stated that his company was willing to entertain ideas for working with Microsoft that would help our Search and/or advertising business, with one of the goals being to prevent Google from dominating those spaces even more than they are now. He was essentially saying that his company would help Microsoft level the playing field with Google in search and advertising. […]

By: Fintan

Fintan — Fri, 11 Nov 2005 21:12:39 +0000

Very interesting analysis. Dugg!

By: TDavid

TDavid — Fri, 11 Nov 2005 20:41:48 +0000

I like the smashed hour glass image idea, Wayne. Something like that would help illustrate sites which are designed to improve and/or enhance our interaction.

By: Wayne Boyer

Wayne Boyer — Fri, 11 Nov 2005 18:25:48 +0000

I wanna see Consumer Reports print your results. There are websites which judge other websites. The Kansas City area recently got several awards for the ugliest websites. They were judged on asthetics values. So WASTED screen space can often get high ratings in the “beauty” department. I say, “Forget that: I want maximum content per square inch.” OTOH, text height has to be adjustable!

We have “Truth in Advertising” and “Truth in Lending” laws, but web design follows artistic freedom. So there has to be evaluations which balance on the Beauty-vs-Practical scale. Sites that pop up an intro screen, this is done in the name of “Beauty”, as if “Don’t you LOVE my bandwidth-robbing animation!”

So to compliment your ruler tool, I would have a series of hour glasses; like the movie ratings. If it’s a simple site, delivering 120 words per screen, it gets 5 smashed hour glassses. If it has 3 words per line, only a single column [such a waste!] then 30 words per screen, it gets one smashed hour glass.

[Maybe the analogy needs some work. Ya get the idea.]

By: Teaching and Developing Online.

Teaching and Developing Online. — Thu, 10 Nov 2005 21:26:46 +0000

Vertical space search engine comparison test results

Recently I wanted to test which search engine used browser real estate in the user’s favor most efficiently? Which of them forced users to scroll to see the results more often or find the content sandwiched between multiple ads? Make…