Scobleizer - Latest Comments in Startups: your web site sucks

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Kabala — Sun, 28 Dec 2008 12:21:05 -0000

thanks

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

acm1971 — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 06:00:44 -0000

Many companies are great in their business, but with the worldwideweb they have their trouble. The website is for the most people the first impression they get of a company. The user should receive a good impression for the first contact.

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Maximilian — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 03:37:41 -0000

I have found one nice tool http://www.GoogleItFaster.com . Is so clean and user-friendly, that I'm surprised why more web searching services are not using that solution. Do you have any idea?

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Design Company Manager — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 07:54:35 -0000

I think that the most easy thing is to blame the others. So let me diagree, not all the sites are bad. And even if you consider they sucks, please substantiate your opinion.

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Stefan — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 20:16:34 -0000

Thanks for your analysis! I'll run an online wine store then... ;-)

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Seanster — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 19:39:44 -0000

Web 2.0 has help online marketers increase traffic in to their website.
A good website that has good content still counts a lot...

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

JG — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 16:41:47 -0000

Hey genius, how about you fix the javascript error on this page before throwing stones at others.

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Jason Kiesel — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 12:55:23 -0000

Great post. I agree with a few caveats. Design can be subjective, and I found a few that I liked that differed from your opinion. On the whole, though, I wasn't too impressed with the selections. I blogged about it - http://blog.freedomspeaks.c... - check it out.

Jason Kiesel
Founder & CEO
Freedom Speaks
http://www.freedomspeaks.com

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

timsdd — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 11:55:01 -0000

Photrade has it's share of funky moments. I had errors damn near a whole day about a week or so ago. I'd classify it as "getting there", otherwise a great site IMO.

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

anon — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 11:07:15 -0000

I really don't see why you think the winelibrary site is so compelling. I went there and all I see are a bunch of videos. Why should I have to sit through a video to find out what a site is offering me? I think that's pretty lame. Give me the text version and convince me that your videos are worth my time. Or is the new standard that Web sites be dumbed down for the illiterate?

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

neil — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 04:46:49 -0000

agreed on the Quantivo website, good site that

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

chris tackett — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 01:04:52 -0000

amen. how so many folks can be this wrong when people like GaryVaynerchuk are showing you how to do it right - FOR FREE!- is really remarkable.

the post is a little harsh, but all points are solid. people just need to have the right frame of mind when reading your blog. it's your blog. your style. your opinions. and they are valid and spot-on.

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Chris Bissell — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 19:41:56 -0000

It is easy to go through a bunch of websites and say they 'suck', because you get hold the bar as high as you like, and you get to ignore whether or not you are the target audience of the company behind the site. Also, you get an almost guaranteed win in the odds game--the odds say that none of the companies in the list will be wildly successful, so it's easy to blanket them with a 'you suck' statement.

A more rigorous critique would ask (and answer) the question: is there a real corollary between the quality of a start-up's initial website and its success as a company? Can we take a survey of past internet start-ups that have succeeded and failed and determine whether the quality of their site was a benefit or a drawback in that success or failure? Can we then distill the qualities of successful start-ups' websites into a set of guidelines that other companies can use to bolster their success?

Of course, as you get further into those 'hard journalism' types of questions, black-and-white analysis turns into shades of grey, and it becomes harder and harder to distill your analysis into a short, controversial post that is guaranteed to get read and responded to by those such as myself :).

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

devolved — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 18:27:56 -0000

Catering to your audience is always of prime concern. You can presume 'who' but not 'how' though, too many website make the mistake of choosing a feature or format because they are familiar with it.

You either stick to what works or make sucess inevitable (ala Google).

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Jas — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 18:15:12 -0000

You must forget how HORRIBLE your blog design was.

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Michele Neylon — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 17:55:13 -0000

If the sites are under embargo why are any of them showing more than a simple logo?
A simple logo with a "coming soon" or "launching at Demo" would have been a lot better than what most of them are showing the world at the moment

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Elijah Grey — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 17:54:47 -0000

Number 10 does have a link that says "English Version".

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Wayne Dawe — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 17:10:00 -0000

Once a company has bought into the Demo or TC50 startup introduction method and put all their marketing effort into polishing their presentation it's not too surprising that their websites suffer. Why put any effort into the site before the big launch? It's a quite different technique then the closed invitation only beta and soft launch that most new social web companies are using now. The big splashy launch is a much risker strategy if you are trying to build buzz and you disappoint (i.e. Cuil) but not as risky if you are trying to raise money and you only need to convince one VC to fund you.

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Rod — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 16:24:32 -0000

I'll tell you one major difference between Kongregate and Wild Pockets: Kongregate doesn't give you a HUGE, NASTY message saying their games are WINDOWS only.

I thought I was in a web browser. Not sure why the operating system even matters.

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

jave — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 16:16:16 -0000

oh dear

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Robert Scoble — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 14:31:58 -0000

Shel Israel: you are right, of course. But in this case, then, Demo screwed up by releasing that list early. That caused thousands of people to visit this list of companies. That's OUR first impression of both the conference and these companies. Demo should have held the list until 7 a.m. on Monday morning, which is when the embargo ends. We'll revisit each of these sites after their demos to see how they do.

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

juanlanteri — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 14:08:49 -0000

hey!

Look at this crappy site, has no video and very poor design:

Google.com

Lets trash it!!!!

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Kris Colvin — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 11:51:09 -0000

But Anthony, I saw something on the DEMO site that said there were 800 attendees... that's not much, compared to the number of clicks from viral marketing and people they could reach outside the actual conference. (I have no idea if that is correct right now.) As RS points out, they won't have a video provided for them of their presentation (I assume they could recreate it or tape it themselves there) so the "killer presentation" is only going to be seen by a select few, and reported on by various degrees of professional, non-professional and non-subject matter journalists and experts. Your site is the TRUE source of best information about your own product.

A presentation is ephemeral. Your website can (ostensibly) last forever. The math on this is very simple to add up, for me.

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

Anthony Farrior — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 11:17:17 -0000

@shel israel You have a point about how they can show before the embargo, but presentation still counts http://www.myphillynetwork....

Re: Startups: your web site sucks

shel israel — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 11:03:11 -0000

Robert,

Sorry, I'm not joined at the hip on this one with you.

Each of these sites is under embargo. Each one of these sites will change this week when they embargo is lifted. For a startup, hustling to get the launch of their company going, leaving a little mess here is the usual option, even though you are right--they could have done a better job. But you core complaint is they are not telling you what you want to know when YOU want to know it, rather than when they have agreed to tell it.