A loyal reader at a multichannel retailer forwarded me this link --- visit the New Look website, to take a peek.
Next, click on View The Gold Look collection. You'll see what appears to be a table, with a magazine that you can open. Drag your mouse over the lower right hand portion of the screen, and thumb through the publication. You'll see merchandise and prices, features on designers and movie stars, and a list of stores that stock the merchandise featured in the "publication".
Is this a brilliant way to advertise merchandise, or is this an attempt to make the web function like the paper-based world? Your thoughts?
Gimmickry - Interesting from a visual standpoint but it shows that some people still confuse the web with "electronic reading." It is a different medium. At least now. In the future it might be cool to have a magazine that connects to the web so I can see more options from the ad - but I don't want to go online to read something more easily read in my easy chair.
ReplyDeleteFun but not functional.
Agree with Paul -- gimmick. Most annoying aspect of page UI is you HAVE to drag and drop -- to be polite, the conventional pageup/pagedown could have been enabled. But no, to page thru the mag, you have to drag the pages across, one by one. This attitude of "use our UI the way we want you to do, damn conventions and your convenience" is what pushes this, for me, from "interesting" to "gimmick".
ReplyDeleteAgree w/ Paul and Alan. A couple of years ago, a Forrester colleague and I wrote a report about "right-channeling" -- the notion that there's a "right" channel for every transaction or interaction from both the customer's and provider's perspective. The online channel is the wrong channel to read a magazine. This is just an example of technology for technology's sake.
ReplyDeletePaul, Alan and Ron, thanks for your comments.
ReplyDeleteHow might they have implemented this strategy in a way (i.e. Alan's comment about pageup/pagedown) that moves it from gimmick to innovative/useful? Or, it is best not to try a strategy of this nature?
If there are any readers out there that find this to be innovative and useful, would you care to comment about the things that make this innovative and useful to you?