Website design and development principles

¶ … Improve the Vendorland Website

The Vendorland.ca website could be improved in several different ways from various perspectives. It could increase its ability to attract advertisers through a better promotional approach; it could become more useful to consumers by changing some of its search features and by adding others; and, in general, it could employ some of the mechanisms demonstrated on competing websites such as on the yellowpages.ca website.

Website Homepage Design Issues

The Vendorland.ca homepage is extremely cluttered with hundreds of links to completely unrelated businesses and consumer interests. There are paid links from almost every conceivable type of product or service and they are displayed so densely packed that it is overwhelming to the consumer. In general, the cluttered page has too many links and, as a result, requires that each of them be very small and difficult for consumers to locate, even if they happen to be in the market for one of the many services advertised.

There are several prominently featured advertisements that would probably detract from the apparent credibility of the website for many consumers. For example, one of the largest links is for a psychic reader that also features a photograph of a matronly-looking woman in her 60s. Naturally, this advertisement immediately creates a negative response on the part of the vast majority of consumers who are likely to regard psychic reading as a complete scam. The fact that this is one of the most prominent advertisements and that it is one of the first images that draws the attention of the consumer is not helpful because it is more likely to detract from the credibility of the entire website than it is to encourage browsers to continue navigating the page to explore other advertisers.

Ineffective Marketing to Prospective Vendor Members

The website does not present an effective message to potential advertisers capable of convincing them to advertise on the website. The middle section of the homepage is intended to appeal to prospective vendors but it is written from the point-of-view of the needs of Vendorland.ca instead of from the perspective of the needs of the prospective vendors. By contrast, the yellowpages.ca website immediately provides a prominent search engine feature that beckons consumers to enter terms of interest.