New Draft - Critque

"Rose and me wrote about "Colour scheme" and added some stuff to what you did".. AND sadly its too long 835 words :) we need to compress it a bit.. you can see where it needs doing..



Site purpose

Both sites clearly show that they are sellers of books. Blackwell’s website is oriented towards selling academic books but Amazon's purpose is to sell a much wider range of books and other items. As a result of Amazon’s selling such a wide range of goods, it may be difficult for the user to know what it doesn't actually stock and this could lead to some users spending time looking for things that aren't there.

Finding the site

Type in the word, "bookshop," into Google and Amazon comes top in the sponsored links; around third in the unpaid listings. Blackwell is not on the first page of listings. This could be in part due to the fact that it is a book specialist and not a general book shop, but it could also be that it is penalised for its badly written code which is unfriendly to search spiders. It has done well to get the bookshop name in its domain, which would suggest there was some planning early on in its development to be easily found.
Amazon’s code is also full of errors but has compensated Google financially and has size on its side.
Search using the works "bookshop academic" and Blackwell now is number one and the only sponsored link. This further demonstrates its specialised academic purpose.

Navigation

Both Amazon and Blackwell’s websites provide a link back to their home pages via their logo at the top left corner. Blackwell employs tabular navigation, as promoted by Steve Krug in the book, "Don't make me Think," and uses this method of structuring to good effect. Showing you where you are and it is easy to move between the tabs. There is additional navigation down the side. Its ever decreasing size shows how you are honing in on what you are looking for.
Amazon has recently changed its navigation style from tabbed navigation to a drop down menu showing departments, or groups of product, which is a reflection of its growing number of items for sale spanning a wide range of categories. Although Amazon had great success with tabular navigation for a number of years, this change was made because the space needed to display a large number of tabs was compromising the site’s functionality. On both Amazon and Blackwell’s sites, it is possible to bypass the navigation system and use the search facility. Through using this we found that Amazon and Blackwell sell for the same global suppliers.

Colour Scheme

Amazon’s colour scheme is very simple which enables the user’s eye to navigate the page quickly and easily. The background is white, a convention which has proven effective in the case of other large corporations’ websites, such as Google. The plain background enables the structure and content of the page to stand out, which is important for Amazon because their products are the key to the success of their website. The navigation bar is blue and spans the width of the page. The white text on the blue background makes it easier to read. The most important features of the page are picked out in orange to attract the eye. As such, this colour is used sparingly.
Blackwell’s home page employs the use of teal blue, which gives an academic feel to the page, giving it gravitas in the minds of the users and reflecting the purpose of the website. The black gradient incorporated into the top header contributes also to this serious feel of the website. The background on the main part of the page is a lighter shade of the same blue hue, which creates visible partitions within the page, enabling the user to know what content is contained within different areas of the page. The tabs across the top of the page change according to which page the user is on, which makes it clear in the user’s mind which page they are on and therefore contributes to the site’s ease of use. The left-hand menu uses orange text on a white background. As evidenced also by Amazon’s website, the use of orange makes features of the page stand out and, on the Blackwell website, it is shown that the left menu, although secondary to the top menu, is still important.

Content

Amazon's content is driven by the user. It uses cookies, tracks your viewing, remembers your IP address and in doing so builds up a database of what sort of user you are and delivers content to you intelligently. Very quickly Amazon has you adding things to your wish list. (And yes I have bought a book while writing this review!). It makes suggestions for books that are similar to the one you are looking at in order to maximise the money you are spending in each transaction.

Blackwell’s website is also database driven but is nowhere near as sophisticated as Amazon's. It simply provides the results of your search in a vertical list with no attempt to sell you anything other than exactly what you have asked for.