Date: April 28, 2000
Author: Ronald Wolak

Subject: Reply 1 to Chaelynne Wolak's Discussion Topic #4

Reply 1 to Chaelynne Wolak's Discussion Topic #4

The usability of a Web site depends on what visitors to the site are trying to accomplish (Spool, Scalon, Schroeder, Synder, & DeAngelo, 1999). The more a site helps visitors locate the information they desire, the more usable it is. Visitors to Toggethis.com and CocaCola.com are primarily looking for information about the companies and the products they offer. Since marketing plays a vital role in the success of Togglethis and Coca-Cola, their multimedia-rich Web sites are very appropriate.

Togglethis

The Togglethis Web site combines color and graphics in a very appealing way (Togglethis, 2000). This site is simple and not overwhelming as some multimedia intensive Web sites have become. The site's use of active button descriptions is also very effective and informative. One negative feature is the site's use of a proprietary multimedia player. This player must be downloaded and installed before visitors are able to view the site's multimedia samples.

During repeated attempts to download the multimedia player with Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator, the author was unsuccessful. This was frustrating and negatively affected the site's usability. The use of an industry standard player, such as QuickTime or RealPlayer, would eliminate the need to download special software and greatly improve the visitor experience (Lynch & Horton, 1999). Another improvement would be to redesign the site to display in video modes higher than VGA and thus use the full screen of higher resolution computer systems.

Coca Cola

Like the Togglethis Web site, the Coca-Cola site includes a significant amount of Flash content (Coca-Cola, 2000). Like Togglethis, the site is simple and appealing. The multimedia content is appropriate and does not detract from the site's overall mission - establishing the Coca-Cola brand name. Coke included one Togglethis promotion along with others that used standard Macromedia viewers. The Togglethis promotions did not load successfully and the Macromedia advertisements did. The ability to access and listen to Coke sponsored radio stations from around the World was also interesting.

References

Coca-Cola. (2000). About the company [Online]. Available: http://www.cocacola.com [2000, April 24].

Lynch, P., & Horton, S. (1999). Web style guide. New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press.

Spool, J., Scalon, T., Schroeder, W., Synder, C., & DeAngelo, T. (1999). Web site usability: A designer's guide. San Francisco, CA: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers.

Togglethis. (2000). Togglethis: Campaigns with character [Online]. Available: http://www.togglethis.com [2000, April 24].