Monthly Review #3: Don’t Make Me Think: Pages 50-93,choose two of the following:
zappos.com- thefryecompany.com
colehaan.commanoloblahnik.comjimmychoo.com- allenedmonds.com
Explore each of your choices, then describe and compare the two sites use of Balance, Unity, Emphasis, and Layout. How do they use these principles and implement Krug’s five important “things” to make sure users see and understand the site? Is one site more effective than the other at drawing your attention, and why?
So I choose The Frye Company and Allen Edmonds, each site looks and feels smooth and styled. The Frye Company really fills the browser’s page and somehow makes you feel there despite the fact that it is no real place(the site). They have the page filled with leather-y tones and no real white space which I liked since sometimes website’s use of White distracts, bores, or makes you feel constrained within the site’s navigation. Allen Edmonds does use white-space as it’s backdrop and uses colorful divs/ads to make you want to click and browse for merchandise.
Emphasis in the navigation are a huge part of the site’s feeling. Frye Comp has large and bold text in the navigation bar while Allen Edmonds navigation is small, tighter and kind of dull.
Each Layout is common among shopping websites, each presents a rollover that pops up over certain categories. Then presents searchable items for sale. Once you choose a item and click, Frye displays huge high quality photos of the product while Allen Edmonds site does have a large photo of the product but also has a lot of descriptive text for the product which Frye does not.