Possibility City Website
Posted by T_Admin @ 10:43 AM March 12, 2008
The folks over at Red7e launched this Louisville branding website in conjunction with the Louisville Extreme Makeover Home Edition episode that aired a few weeks ago.
Its an interesting look at our city, but is the site effective? In addition, this brings to light the whole Possibility City campaign. Thoughts? Comments? Anything else worth posting on this subject?
T_Admin
Yeah, Velvet_Elvis is right.
Its pretty to look at, but seems shallow to me. Once I do find all the links, there's really nothing for me once I get inside. Besides the media page, it seems like a 2-tiered website.
I could see calling out the links in a cool way and working on finding something to do once you get someone inside a page.
Overall – I like the design and colors on the site, but agree it’s not user friendly. While I dig the use of word creativity (can-do-ology) and associated definition (n. the study of near-infinite recreational possibilities), it seems like a pretty blatant copy of snickers national OOH campaign (I am sure you remember -- "Satisfectellent," "Hungerectomy," and "Substantialicious.”). I agree with Velvet_Elvis about remembering which graphic goes with which link. It makes the site novel at first, but then it becomes tiring. I would be curious to know more about the guidelines given to the team who pulled this together to better understand the end result. Specifically b/c I am not sure who the target audience is (residents or more likely tourists/people relocating). Regardless it seems to be a younger demo, so kudos to the copy writer. The site’s language is fresh and fun – very in-line with the demographic I suspect Louisville wants to attract from other cities.
I like the feel of the design. Very nickelodeon to me, which I like. The font (used in the loader) bothers me though. Reminds me a lot of taco bell. I keep expecting to see a chihuahua head pop out any minute. Like mentioned before, I also wish the site had more to do/ content. Maybe view the local business, restaurants, and attractions without going to another website. Maybe a combination of the first version with this one.
Overall I think this is a decent site. I really like the use of vibrant color and the collage illustrations. I like the idea of having to search for the links, but I feel they could have been somehow more obvious. I do agree with lobo in that the overall feel of the site seems like a page Nikelodeon has sprayed their scent on. I also miss the additional content the previous site offered. Aside from those few things, thumbs up duuuuuuudes!
This is a pretty nice site. I dig the colors. I do agree that I would have liked to have seen a bit more content infused. However, that being said I do believe that a site like this can evolve over time to accommodate those things. Not being in the know on a project leaves a lot of things to speculation, but without those questions answered, I would say overall- cool project. Definitely a nice new addition to Louisville's promotion arsenal. I wonder what else is in store.
- Dave / VS
Just to throw out an idea (I like the art, do agree it's a little challenging on the user), it's hard to really offer true constructive criticism on piece if we don't know the intended audience, tone, most relevant message, etc. Not that anyone is going to share their briefs with this site's administrators or anyone else, but when I look at advertising executions, they may not be effective for me. Yet, they may very much hit their mark based on the brief. Any thoughts on how we might discover some of this when looking at posts? Just a suggestion.
As Creative individuals, I think people's gut opinions and reactions are still pretty valid. But I see your point as well.
In our quest to get every Creative in town on board with this site, I hope that the members of the agency that worked on specific jobs will chime in as well with some of that insight.
Sometimes, a design can be deemed successful if you know the parameters in which the designer(s) were working. So, I hope those that worked on this concept (and future works posted) will join into the discussion.
Here's to hoping.
Isn't deciding success by parameters a little like grading on a curve? It's a communication business. It does or it doesn't communicate (to the intended audience.)
I'm in no way referencing the site of discussion when I ponder introducing a "We Did the Best We Could with What We Had" awards show at which they pass out participation trophies.
Again, for clarification, this post is only intended to address the posts in the thread rather than the work.
I found this article in Business First from May of last year.
With a preliminary budget of $2 million, and this being the final outcome... I would say it falls extremely short of being what it could have been.
The website for Louisville could have been the best one in the country with a budget like that. Granted, a lot of that money went to research, commercials, and other stuff, but the website should have acted as the primary piece of the overall campaign, because that is what people have access to more than anything.
1. Velvet_Elvis says:
March 12, 2008 3:14 PM
First the positive- It is a visually interesting and stunning piece, would make a great print Ad.
Now the negative- As with a lot of web sites, it looks cool, but it isn't very User friendly. I have to mouse over everything to know what is a link and what isn't. Then I have to remember which graphic goes with which link. And what if I miss rolling over a link; I will be missing out on a whole other part of the site. As far as usability goes, it doesn't quite hit the mark.