I read about the facelift of the Basecamp homepage on SVN and several small but important things jumped out at me when I broke down the layout of the page. So I’m doing my OWN critique and presenting MY thoughts on how I would improve the design.

There were of course several comments on the post, most either in favor of the design or discussing the ramifications of the A/B test 37s conducted to decide on the final design.

The things about the redesign I noticed immediately were:

1. the header: in my opinion, lots of wasted space. Though the tagline was very effective and grabs attention immediately, the icons and visual didn’t seem to clearly communicate the message. For an existing user, the icons make sense, but for a new user, they may seem a little more ambiguous. Finally, the initial CTA [See Plans and Pricing] is asking me to take action too soon.

2. The videos act as credibility builders but here, I’m invited view these videos before I have a real idea of what Basecamp is, and why I want to see how others are using it. Good asset and information, not the right placement on the page.

3. These are the assets I feel best illustrate the key messaging at the top of the page. The user sees these important bits only if they hang in after deciding whether or not to view the videos and then continuing to scroll down the page.

3a. I can see clicks coming from this point, but with an effective action point at top and bottom I would think there’d be no need for an action here. It also seems to break from the look, feel and style of the rest of the page with the watercolor brush texture behind the link.

Original Basecamp Homepage (Full Screen)

My Humble Solution

1. Simplify the header; focus on the key message; Grab their attention and give the user an immediate pitch and a quick leadin to credibility.

2. Move the screenshots up on the page; immediately present the user with the key benefits of the product

3. Now maybe the user has a good sense of what Basecamp is, give them a large obvious call to action option followed by a secondary option [Take a tour of Basecamp] to get more information before committing.

4. Now, if they still need more convincing at this point, the last half of the page groups together more credibility builders, supporting info and benefits.

Basecamp Homepage Revised (Full Screen)

Obviously this a rough, thrown together composition. I’m also of course not privy to any of 37s marketing goals or objectives but what I think this layout would accomplish is better focusing on the selling points of the product at the top of the page, presenting the primary benefits that support the key message and clearly presenting users with a primary and secondary call to action.

One of my main goals was to condense the header, which is one spot where I think I failed in my solution. My primary CTA button may be a little larger than necessary too but hey, it’s meant to grab attention.

As I said, this is simply my own personal opinion on what I would do to improve this page. Obviously 37s has done something right over the years so who’s to say their formula won’t work perfectly fine as is. It’s an exploration and an exercise in critique and discussion is welcome. I’d love to hear thoughts!

It just so happens we recently launched a website for Audet & Partners, so we had some good insight to share. Read the article at http://lawyersusaonline.com/blog/2010/06/29/choosing-pictures-for-your-website/

If you pay any attention to the cable industry / Internet industry you know there is a great speed race going on. All the major cable companies, communication companies, and Google are in a race to get high speed to the masses.

We’ve been told for the past few years that broadband is fast, just like DSL was fast and 56k was fast. But the truth is, there is a long way to go before we reach the possibilities of true high speed Internet. One thing is for sure though; everything will change with a true high speed Internet. Yes, that’s right. We are in for another technology revolution. We just don’t know what it will look like yet.

Google, it’s always Google.

Recently Google has launched a Fiber for Communities program that will deliver 1GB per second speeds to hand selected communities around the country. This program will cover anywhere from 50,000 to 500,000 people. The 1GB speed is approximately 100 times faster than current high speed connections.

Here’s the catch though, Google doesn’t have any plans to expand the Fiber for Communities program. So why would Google put time and resources into creating a 1GB network for only a small group of communities? In a word, discovery.

Google is about data, information, indexes, providing you with communication. And they want to provide you with that information and data 24×7, 365 days per year. Google will not be the Internet provider of the future, but they are preparing to provide everything else.

Google is doing what Google does, they stay ahead of the competition. By putting the Fiber for Communities program together, they can see what home and office user do with the newly acquired speed. They can provide special web services, portal, etc just for this community. What are the possibilities when you have 1GB per second? That’s what they want to find out.

The 10GB Age

Just for fun, what would a 10GB per second Internet world look like? Let’s take it a step further, what would a 10GB per second Internet AND wireless data look like? We’re talking instant data from any location on the earth.

Here are a few of my own guesses.

True “On Demand”

As much as our current cable companies want us to believe that they are providing “On Demand” services, they aren’t. When I go to my current cable company On Demand menu, there are a few hundred movies there and they are constantly being removed and updated in a cycle. Not exactly revolutionary.

In the 10GB world you would turn on your TV go to “On Demand” and be able to search for every movie ever made from the beginning of cinema. Every TV show, every commercial, every video game, every everything! It would be delivered to you instantly with a click of the button in HD quality. In the 10GB world you can also throw out the wired restrictions. How about getting a full HD movie delivered directly to your cell phone in perfect quality? Now that’s true “On Demand”.

As you can imagine the numbers of movies, tv shows, etc, would be extremely large. There would be so much data and information that we would need a logical, accurate way to browse and search. Google anyone? Yes, the future On Demand might be provided by your Cable Company but don’t be surprised if the search engine is ran by Google. That Fiber for Communities program is not sounding like such a bad idea now, is it?

True Video Phones

I keep stating “true” in front of the title because we don’t actually have the services we think we do. The corporations do a good job of making us think we have these futuristic devices, but we really don’t. How many times did Captain Kirk have a dropped call on the Enterprise? You see my point.

In the 10GB world you will have a high resolution video camera that will instantly stream your video and voice over the phone to anywhere in the world. Your picture and audio will show up on the receiver’s video phone in perfect quality and tone. No dropped calls, no pixilated videos, no delays. Just true video calls on a handheld phone.

Data Centralization

My biggest complaint about all the technology I use now (office computer, home computer, email, phone, iPod, car navigation, etc,.) is that they can’t and don’t communicate. I want my GPS navigation system to be able to instantly access any address I have in my address book, email, or on my phone. I want my home computer and my office computer to be in sync all the time. I want to be able to send my wife a song instantly from my iPod. I want instant transfer and sync from all my devices, all the time.

The 10GB world will provide instant data centralization to all my devices. Even the devices I can’t imagine yet. How about setting your DVR from your car’s computer system? How about checking the grocery list stored on your refrigerators computer system while at the store?

The Death of the Internet

…as we know it. The Internet isn’t going anywhere, it will still be here. You just won’t recognize it. The Internet wasn’t created with high speed in mind; the entire infrastructure was built to delivery small files over large distances. Web pages were created because they were simple and effective. But web pages are not essential to the Internet, they aren’t even logical. Web pages in the future will be phased out very much the same way that the newspaper and print world is dying a slow death. It’s inevitable.

As humans we want to see, hear and experience our media. It’s natural. When I go to the NFL website, I want to see videos, watch highlight, hear analysis. Yeah I’ll read articles sometimes, but I would gladly watch a video on the same subject.

That’s true of the vast majority of website we visit each day. We want video, we want audio, and we want instant streaming video updates. Instead of going to a website and reading the introduction about a company or product, we will be provided with a video that let’s us experience it. That’s the future.

The Big Merge

Now that the 10GB world has killed the Internet as we know it, where does that leave us? It brings us to the big merge of Internet and Television. Yes, in the 10GB world there will be no difference between and TV and a computer. Your living room TV will be able to provide you with everything your computer can and vice versa. Instant data, instant communication, instant everything, all the time.

The One Thing I Know For Sure

It’s fun and natural to look down the road to see where our technology is taking us. By looking at our technology today, we can see what’s possible in our future. However, the one thing I know for sure is that the biggest benefit of the 10GB world is not listed in this post. That’s because it hasn’t been invented or thought of yet. That’s the real exciting idea of the true high speed world; someone will invent something we won’t be able to live without. Just like most of us couldn’t imagine living without our current inferior Internet now. Someday we will look back on these medieval days of technology and wonder how we got anything done. I can’t wait.

But for now, I’ll just get back to creating websites on my slow 8MG “high speed” connection.

BTW

Just for kicks, here are few more bullet point ideas on what I think the 10MG world would provide:

• Live events streamed from hand-held devices, instantly to computers around the world.
• Advertising and commercials will be more personable, they will be directed at you as their target audience. You will click on commercials within a TV show or a product within a TV show which brings up information instantly. Want to know where to buy that jacket that Brad Pitt is wearing? No problem, just click on it.
• At first all the data will be noise, but the smart companies will figure out how to make it organized. Enhanced, easier, smarter.
• Robot Ninjas. Not really anything to do with 10GB world, I just would really like to see a robot ninja in action.