Site Reference Forums

Wizard of Oz · 2006-03-20 02:07:34

Regarding Mark's comments about the 'ugly' sites and the couple of examples that were given in this article.

The one site 'Plenty of Fish', is interesting in so far as it really has no real aesthetic appeal, but as Mark says, it is reported to bring in $300,000 per DAY in Adsense revenue (maybe people are so much in a hurry to leave, they click the brightest link they see - the adsense links.... I jest). Obviously, these people have found a way to use adsense to it's absolute best advantage, unlike $50 a month miracles like me....

I see no SEO whatsoever. At least not at first glance. There is hardly any keyword text (or text at all) anywhere on the pages. Of course, their Adsense is placed so that it almost appears to be what the site is really about (the same way many place their Adsense stuff a la Google's instructions for best advantage.

Another thing that's immediately obvious to me, is they just GET STRAIGHT INTO IT. No crap, no rubbish, just people to meet... Oh and Adsense too...

One thing is irrefutable, an alexa ranking of 1376 is a hell of a lot of traffic. Their home page PR is a midling 5 (what does this tell us? I',m not game to say.... glad

Thanks,
Steve:)

DJKay · 2006-03-20 08:11:22

Hi Steve,

New to the forum. Uglyness has worked for as long as I can remember accross many different marketing channels such as Direct Mail, Television, fax, phone, etc. This is not a new type of execution technique in regards to marketing. The article just demonstrates the power of ugliness in the context of the web, web site, and online marketing.

For example, think about Dunkin Donuts & their logo--their colors are pink, brown, and orange--their packaging, the way their coffee shops are decorated, pretty darn ugly..... but they make a ton of money selling coffee.

MacDonalds--their colors are red, yellow, and their locations are layed out in those garrish colors..but they are one of the biggest fast food companies in the world.

I could go on talking about this because I have been in Marketing a long time--but I just want to thank the author for taking this concept and executing it in a web context.

Best Regards,

DJKay

neojacker · 2006-03-20 08:30:52

Ugly only sells to those that want cheap and cheerful. We should be very careful not to belittle design and creativity. I am in total disagreement with the gist of the article apart from the fact that eBay only works on low cost and 'bargain' goods.

Plenty of fish is only a success because it is a FREE dating website!

As a creative professional there simply is no substitute to good design. Poor design only attracts bargain hunters - period. My clients have products that deserve quality design to appeal to their chosen demographic. I do agree that site must be extremely easy to navigate and preferably without flash content which just bores the potential customer and makes them wait to get to the product or service.

A good product MUST have good design and also a good photography to sell it. To use ugly will just lower your profit margin and much worse than that will just give people the wrong impression about your business!

mark · 2006-03-20 08:33:17

neojacker wrote:
As a creative professional there simply is no substitute to good design. Poor design only attracts bargain hunters - period. My clients have products that deserve quality design to appeal to their chosen demographic. I do agree that site must be extremely easy to navigate and preferably without flash content which just bores the potential customer and makes them wait to get to the product or service.

I think this is very much on the point - look at eBay. I suspect that they have an ugly website on purpose. The look is that of discount, or of a flea market, and people grow to expect that.

Therefore, if you are aiming for discount shoppers, cheap may be a good way to go.

Tribune · 2006-03-20 10:06:41

neojacker wrote:

As a creative professional there simply is no substitute to good design. Poor design only attracts bargain hunters - period.

--------

Have to disagree with that. I have a property site for Monaco that hasn't essentially changed since 1997. It's awful. Really. And am going to get the person who does our sites to radically change it soon.

But we get plenty of people filling in the form with budgets over US $10 million for a property and plenty visiting Monaco.

Not what I would call bargain hunters.

Roger

mark · 2006-03-20 10:09:10

This is also why I pointed out that there are two aspects of 'ugly' websites that make them successful - 1) the attraction to bargain hunters, but 2) the functionality that many 'ugly' websites have.

I think the biggest lesson I learned from this is the functionality over form, rather than the other way around, is one of the most important aspects of a successful website.

jamble · 2006-03-20 10:48:25

New here too, I think I may arrived via digging around on digg to find the article.

As a web designer I thought it posed some interesting thoughts but in all honesty I don't think it's a very well reasoned arguement especially when you take into account the two sites mentioned - plentyoffish and ebay.

They both offer something nobody else does and on a scale that is simply incomparable with other rivals offering the same thing.

Ebay is a huge, established international brand. Yes, their site is ugly as sin but it's gone through small design changes as it's grown but I think a large part of their keeping it "old school" in design terms is that their user base is generally not the computer savvy type rather the average person who probably uses email or maybe looks up a train time but doesn't do much else with the internet. Why bother changing the site when their average user is likely to be confused and lost. Each minute that passes where these people aren't able to buy and sell is going to be serious lost revenue for Ebay.

The free online dating site .. well, as far as I've seen online dating sites charge you to contact potential matches. Surely it's like shooting fish in a barrel here by offering something a lot of people want at no cost as opposed to charging. It's not really a design issue I think, it's a simple price led one for the viewer/user.

Ugly doesn't sell anything, the two sites given as an example sell because they have strong USP's not a deliberate and clever "ugly" design.

The monaco property site mentioned above sells things because it's a genuine niche market and I assume the actual selling of $10m properties doesn't take place in a shabby office once a prospective client makes contact.

There's a lot that could be done with this article but I think perhaps with better examples of sites that are successful purely because of their design, not in spite of it.

There's a strong arguement for a site like ebay to rebuild their site using strong compliant markup purely because the bandwidth savings would be massive even if they just redesigned it to look the same!

mark · 2006-03-20 10:57:54

There are plenty of examples of sites that are successful that are also visually unappealing. Going through one naseating example after another, though, would get redundant.

What makes ugly websites effective, though, is that they present their own unique message and often present the easiest functionality possible. Now I did add the disclaimer that beautifying websites is not necessarily a bad thing, but with some niche websites it could be. Ugly websites do give the feeling of dealing with a small company, which people tend to trust more...

BTW...welcome to the forums. glad

SoopahMan · 2006-03-20 13:01:56

Free - The consistent feature among these sites - missed in this article - is that all these sites are free. Craigslist has a deep commitment to being free, and it appears PlentyOfFish does as well - it's their tag line.

Craigslist is actually a very clean site now though - I would argue it's less ugly and more leaning towards a minimalist style of design. This is notable because Craigslist is not technically free anymore for a slim set of users - they add a category or 2 to the "pay for" list every few years. Real Estate in New York, for example, is now a pay-for-posting situation.

And I've long wondered how well the ugly-ish IMDB "Pro" does, the pay-for services of IMDB. This is the most significant pairing of ugly and money that comes to mind, other than maybe the horrendous eBay listings you can often find.

So, what does this mean?

Value vs Style
I'm going to bet that the bargain shopper - whether they be rich or poor - will prefer the less-designed, free site, while the guys you see wearing rings that aren't symbols of marriage and the girls with the shades the size of their face will prefer to pay for a dating site, or real estate listing, or whatever. Because one values value, and the other values style. They're ways of life.

Ironically, in the case of a dating site, this might be really good - just by visiting PlentyOfFish.com or OKCupid.com and not paying, or paying for Match.com or the like, you happen to be placing yourself with a group of like-minded people by that very decision - you've taken a good step towards compatibility implicitly.

Confidence and Money
One last thing I'm sure this ties into is the association between confidence and credit cards. People are more scared of putting their credit card information into a site that looks like crap, because they don't trust where the information and money are going. It's reasonable to suggest that if Match.com spent more on design (honestly, they could use it), they could make more money without changing a bit of functionality, because of the number of users they don't scare off. Likewise, PlentyOfFish and OKCupid never ask a thing from the user, and so the user never demands a professional-looking site. MySpace fits in here too.

mactheweb · 2006-03-20 13:08:55

Hey, remember content? If a site is worth visiting because it has good content, features, prices or services it is still worthwhile, ugly or not. Do a quick Google search for "SAD lights" (seasonal affective disorder). All of the top rankings are ugly but they do provide good information on the disorder and how their products help. I bought from one.

I'm taking your article as confirmation that style has not won out completely over substance. That said, I imagine that with two sites of equal value and SEO attention, the more attractive one will get more traffic.

mark · 2006-03-20 13:13:06

Not necessarily. There is another aspect which I did not focus on, but did mention. Ugly does deliver a marketing message. Some people don't want to buy from what they see as a marketing team putting together a website - they simply feel more comfortable with the simple, basic website that they know was established by a person.

fonetik · 2006-03-20 13:27:04

I think the author has twisted the meaning of design. Design by definition is focused on function.

Something is well designed when it works perfectly. For web site design, aesthetics do play a role in facilitating function, as colors and layout distictly impact readability and discovery of functionality, but it is aesthetics in the service of function. Aesthetics independent of function is the realm of fine art, not of design. Visit any fine arts portfolio website. Most are visual gems when viewed as a static unused object, but are tortuous to use.

Another huge point that the author gets wrong -
well designed websites are almost always simple;
ugly websites are almost always complex.

The whole point of design is for the designer to reduce the content to its essence. Time is spent by one individual in design. Time is saved for the many users who are not forced to wade through the chaff. This is a thing of beauty because it functions as it should, not because it is an ivory tower.

mark · 2006-03-20 13:34:43

Welcome to the forums - and thanks for the feedback.

My goal was to clarify the meaning of design. The goal is to give people an idea of the priorities that they need in design - functionality first, marketing message second, design elements third. In fact, the design elements should be molded to the first two priorities.

The fact is, though, there are legitimate reasons to use 'ugly' graphics to improve the effectiveness of your website.

Mutilated1 · 2006-03-20 13:50:17

Its funny - all these people coming from Slashdot to comment. Slashdot is one of the ugliest websites around. Functional yes, pretty ? err... no. Kind of prooves the point of the article.

I think that because the design elements of a website are the easiest to improve, that we do tend to overlook functionality and content/message. Its easier to tweak stylesheets and play with the layout to make it "pretty" than it is to rewrite really usefull content.

It was a good article I think. Reminds me of the discussion about we were having a couple weeks ago about creating crappy websites for Google AdSense ( http://forums.site-reference.com/topic/ … e-AdSense/ )

Seibertron · 2006-03-20 13:58:31

One of my co-workers/buddies sent me this link to see if I was using AdSense on my website. I'm not, but this article has piqued my interest for two reasons.

1) The potential money to be made.
2) The point about how an attractive website doesn't necessarily mean it's a successful website
3) Less intuitive or less complex websites can actually be more successful for those very reasons

My site is one of the largest Transformers websites on the Internet (SEIBERTRON.com) ... and content-wise it still might be. However, my site's popularity is continuously trumped by two of it's competitors which sport a much simpler design. I like my competitors' websites which I visit almost daily ... but I'm always frustrated that their lack of programming skills and/or graphic design (one of which is redesigned about every 4 months) seem to out-do what must be an overly complicated design on my website that "Joe-Shmoe-Internet-User" must have a difficult time using. I mean no offense to my competitors, I'm just stating what appear to be facts that coincide with this article.

As a professional ASP and PHP programmer who has a little more Photoshop skill than the average user, I always pride myself that I really know what I'm doing. But somehow, my 2 biggest competitors who basically run templated websites using phpNuke or vBulletin to power their websites seem to have me beat (which in turn gives more credence to this article from slashdot.org).

The Alexa.com stats speak for themselves for my site and its top 2 competitors:

http://www.seibertron.com (my site)
http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traff … ertron.com

http://www.tfw2005.com/
http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traff … fw2005.com

http://www.allspark.com/
http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traff … lspark.com

Last edited by Seibertron (2006-03-20 14:50:10)

Abanti · 2006-03-20 14:00:58

All of the examples given are not what I would consider ugly (except perhaps eBay). It seems that web designers often mistake simplicity for ugliness. I find that the simplicity of these sites gives them a certain elegance that the supposedly more sophisticated sites lack. I think YourMonaco.com is a particularly nice example (Leave it the way it is, Tribune). Fancier designs are often more distacting than appealing.

fonetik · 2006-03-20 14:11:57

As was noted by a previous commenter, it is obvious that websites can be successful in SPITE of being ugly.

To prove the contention of this article, it must be proved that some websites are successful BECAUSE of being ugly.

It is the difference between correlation and causality; a very important difference.

To truly make any of these websites less ugly would actually make them more functional.

All of ugly examples are functional as is, and they are probably succesfull because they are the most functional website in whatever niche they find themselves.

Take Slashdot, for instance (though the following would apply to any of the previous examples). Give it some colors that are easier on the eye; clean up and standardize the layout; remove some of the extraneous information; get some decent icons. The site now has better design. It is more functional. And I think the increased functionality would increase success, though I doubt any of us are capable of proving this point either way.

I think the real point that was trying to come out here is that content is everything.

A well designed website WITHOUT good content will never be successfull.
A poorly designed website WITH good content can be successfull in spite of its design.

mark · 2006-03-20 14:24:05

Ughh...don't oversimplify the article. Sure, content is everything, but if that's the article, then it is a pretty boring article (content is everything has been said before).

There is the other aspect of some ugly sites that are able to speak to their audience better. The reason? Some people do not like being marketing to and ugly websites do not feel like marketing ploys (not all the time, but some of the time)

There are two aspects of ugly sites that make them effective - the simplicity is one (you don't need an ugly site to be simple), but the trust is another major factor that CANNOT be ignored.

Dodito · 2006-03-20 14:29:28

I think many on here misinterpreted the article (and the writer stated it so clearly): what can we LEARN from ugly sites which still make (a lot of) money.

What is overlooked is this: they address a basic need (and offer an immediate solution: dates, things to sell/buy. So fucntionality yes.. content.. also yes (though content is overrated compared to the social/communicative aspect of internet) but also: how effectively does it address a problem.. and can it do a better job than anyone else.

Ad bases sites with different services (when will we have the ad-based Ebay alternative ?) are nothing new.. and Google's adwords is only the beginning. Amazon now has contextual advertizing as well.. and many more will come.. behavioral advertizing, pay per call, lead whatever. These extended ad-services in combination with a drive online away from classic media which has barely begun.. means interesting new business models.

It basically is one new very simple business model: you have a problem, we offer a (some sort) of solution, we make it hell easy for you to use.. and it is FREE YEAH. Free used to be crap.. but everyone understands it's not really really free.. it's.. paid in a different way. Besides.. in one second we can see if it is really crap.. or..

Those ugly sites do so well also because they waited 5-7 years (maybe I am wrong ?) before things took off.. because it's NOT about the content per se.. it's about the COMMUNITY. And it takes time before the community reaches critical mass. (Community in the widest sense of the word.. social networking included).

Nevertheless author has a good point that the average user is over-estimated. People always use the most simple tools. Email, IM.. and that's about it. That is why all cool new tools focus on more sophisticated groups: linkedin for business, myspace for youth etc.

One tends to forget there is a huge amount of good income generating 35-60 year olds out there.. that have needs to be addressed well as well.

airshowfan · 2006-03-20 14:58:49

"There is another aspect which I did not focus on, but did mention. Ugly does deliver a marketing message. Some people don't want to buy from what they see as a marketing team putting together a website - they simply feel more comfortable with the simple, basic website that they know was established by a person" ... "Some people do not like being marketing to and ugly websites do not feel like marketing ploys".

In other words, ugly websites are like those tv commercials with poor lighting, shaky cameras that keep zooming in and out all the time, trying to look like they were actually shot in someone's home while a housewife (a not-really-attractive "maybe she's not an actress" type) does the housekeeping and tells the company-representative/interviewer how this household product has really helped her. Or those commercials that look like they are interviewing people who are eating or working at the fast-food restaurant, or just walking out of the movie, or those commercials where a letter from a happy customer is read and its story is shown. Some of these commercials might actually be genuine, but they do work really hard to try and say "we fired the marketing team, borrowed a camcorder, and are letting you, the user, tell your story" - which is probably not exactly what happens... In any case, I totally agree. Ugly websites look more genuine.

"Take Slashdot, for instance (though the following would apply to any of the previous examples). Give it some colors that are easier on the eye; clean up and standardize the layout; remove some of the extraneous information; get some decent icons."

eBay, Slashdot, Google search results, and CraigsList - and others like Fark, basically any site where most of the page is taken up by lots of text - are not ugly. They're plain. "Ugly" means it uses bad colors and Times New Roman (or worse) fonts, logos that are pixellated and inelegant, graphics compressed beyong clarity (and probably not that clear BEFORE compression). "Plain" means there are few colors, graphics, or icons. The thing is, when a site has a LOT of content, a LOT of information, and a user goes there to browse through a big chunk of that information, then anything other than text just gets in the way. In these cases, "pretty design" just displaces the text, forces the page to be bigger (and thus stick out beyond or below the edge of the window), forces the font to be smaller, or spreads content over more pages so it takes more clicks to find what you're looking for. Now, I'm all for pretty content. I love web design, laying out text and images and navigational elements and the occasional ad in a way that is elegant, roomy, harmonious, easy on the eyes, and organized. But when a site has LOTS of content - when a site is basically a giant index of indices, or just lots of text that needs to be looked through - then you pretty much have to get rid of the images, icons, rouded corners, and logos, and just build a page made up of lots of rectangles of text and links. Like CraigsList. I mean, look at the way a magazine is laid out, and look at the way your phone book is laid out. If your phone book were laid out like a magazine, it would be several times thicker than it already is, and all the pretty design would just get in the way of finding what you're looking for. Or look at most blogs. Why are they plain-looking? No, not just because the writers don't know HTML, they could copy and paste a template from any of a number of blog-template sites. Blogs are plain because they are about the writing. They are about content. Users should get lost and immersed in the writing, not in the pretty environment of the site-browsing itself. For some sites, having lots of pages, each with a little content, is best, and those sites should be pretty. For some sites, having few pages, each with lots of content, is best, and those sites should be plain. If Slashdot devoted more space to pretty graphics and buffer space between the text, less text would fit, or I'd have to scroll around more to read it (or squint at the tiny letters). No one wants that. Well, except maybe Fonetik does ;]

I'll give you one more reason why I trust plain sites more: They imply simplicity. Their back-end might be every bit as complicated, inelegant, and unreliable as that of a complicated site, if not worse. But you just think it probably isn't. You don't expect to get errors and bugs from plain sites, you expect that from fancy-looking, professional sites that were clearly designed by a large group of highly-paid "computer people". Plain sites look less ambitious, which makes them look less technically ambitious, which makes them seem more technically reliable. Which may or may not be the case, but still.

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The Surprising Truth About Ugly Websites

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neojacker wrote:

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