Web Watch-Jul07

Hot: http://www.accenture.com/

Many people perceive IT as boring, corporate and full of white papers. While it's true to a certain extent, Accenture has visually communicated an online image of living life to the fullest, with the help of today's technology.

The site is cleverly designed with usability in mind, yet using a full background image to break apart the invisible boundaries and create a dynamic flow. General information is highlighted by big bold fonts, and a drop down list links to more specific details.

Almost every other page of Accenture is done with the objective of conveying useful messages to their audience, leading the audience without them having to ask, "What's next?" It's a site that promotes a great user experience and that's important on a corporate site which tends to be monotonous most of the time.

Instead of the usual hard selling services, Accenture did it the subtle way by prompting visitors how they may be assisted through indirect phrases.

Rating: 5/5

NOT: http://www.bloomberg.com/

My first reaction was to double check if the URL had been keyed in correctly when I visited the site. I thought someone had defaced Bloomberg.

The colour combination took some getting used to, as it looks so much like a first generation homepage. It was hard to concentration with so many things shouting at me at the same time. There were definitely difficulties encountered while reading headlines off the main page, especially for the dyslexic.

Categorisation of headers, headlines, subtext and menu are poorly managed as they all share the same font, colour and sometimes, even size. Content text format are inconsistent in different sub-sections which makes it even harder for audience to develop familiarity. It would also be better to presenting content using Ajax technology for some parts of the site arranged with tabs.

On the up side, kudos to go to the purposefully arranged main page sections of news, charts and stock figures, which saves time for returning eyeballs.

Rating: 3/5

Alan Leong

Creative Director

VibrantStyle