microsites?
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- vague
companies like nike, adidas, etc... these guys all have microsites developed all the time for all these random purposes, promos, or for individual new products, and they all always look like they have huge budgets behind them and are produced by bigname places.
except... i have never, ever found these microsites anywhere except for on design blogs, by the design community itself.
in fact, i dont know of a single average person who has ever been to one of these microsites on his own accord, or anyone who would have any means of finding these microsites, or knowing of their existence.
am i wrong in thinking that the majority of peolpe, even consumers of these brands, never even know about these microsites? i dont see them promoted or advertised anywhere... so then why spend so much money on them, if the only people looking at them are other designers admiring the execution?
- mimeartist0
stop hanging out with average people
- Llyod0
what the hell is vague talking about?
- 98328923980
vague has a point.
i have never ever spoken to a sinle person in my life that ever mentioned getting his shoes after seeing such microsite.
yet i have no idea about the reality. i am also not really much of a sneaker fan, so what do i know.
- vague0
example.
http://www.guiborchert.com/work/…
looks cool.. yet, its nowhere to be found, and was probably only online for like 1 month, and i bet close to no one ever even saw it.
so, what the point?
- ukit0
The point is that whether people look at them or not, Nike has tons of money to burn and isn't going to stop. You should be glad, it's probably keeping a lot of companies in business.
- Llyod0
all nike has going for it is it's brand. it produces shitty quality goods.
- You wouldn't happen to be a Converse wearer would you?ElectroLAX3000
- stop wearing bloody sneakers and buy real shoes.9832892398
- ismith0
I visit this one all the time: http://www.visitborders.com/
Does that count? Aside from that, I can't think of a single one I go to for anything but to say 'that looks cool...'
- Jaline0
Hmmm...you may have something there.
Who knows though. Obviously people are finding out about these products somehow. I doubt that many of them visit microsites though. Isn't there a hierarchy? Like someone from the company or clients get the word out, they get the word out to others, etc.
- vague0
its true that Nike has a shitload of money, so they probably dont care, but i really am interested in how they expect people to find all this stuff? theres so many companies that do this, sneaker companies, car companies, etc, and each have a ton of microsites to each...
..but how do they get these things advertised and promoted and out there for people to see? i just dont get it. its like theyre completely hidden, except like i said, to the design community, and maybe loosely related other portals
- Billboards and promo commercials often have the URLs. Also banners at promo events and such.ismith
- Bleip0
Answer: banners.
- tgqt0
think of how many porn microsites there are. The more tributaries the larger the eventual river.
- monNom0
I would suspect they link off the home page...
- killerqueen0
Vague, the problem is you're seeing a microsite as a traditional shotgun advertisement, rather than a way to offer a specific experience to a specific group.
These microsite help cultivate and draw in very specific niche groups. Nike bets on artists/designers spreading these sites around their little communities, like Newstoday. Artists/Designers work and thrive heavily on the internet, with blogs and portals and networking sites. They also have a fair amount of purchasing power and are considered trendsetters. Therefore, you have people who will communicate and dictate trends better than anyone else. It makes sense to appeal to them and make compelling content like "Art of Speed" to get attention from these groups.
A lot of the Nike and Addidas microsites are specifically for designers and artists. Take "Art of Speed" for instance, or Nike Restoration...these are projects that would appeal to artists, musicians, designers, and the sartorially astute among us.
The Jumpman portal from Nike is another excellent way in which these microsites don't serve as traditional advertisements, but rather ongoing and evolving means to cultivate a niche group. The Jumpman sites and features don't appeal to the exact same Artists/desigers as "Art of Speed" do....Jumpman is more for sneaker heads. But they have their own fashion/trendsetting blog world to communicate and dictate trends.
- mtgentry0
Adweek says more money will go to social networking sites than Microsites this year. Things like Facebook aps and myspace pages. Bad news for us.
- jamble0
I've bought 2 lots of shoes from Nike microsites in the past, (the Nike Free running shoes) which I bought customised via the microsite for those particular shoes.
The thing with Nike I guess is they need to continue spending on advertising no matter what to keep their brand at the forefront and by developing slick flash sites which will inevitably appear on blogs and places like FWA they're getting in touch with a lot of design savvy types who are likely to make use of their services.
- nearestexit0
Ya, banner ads. My previous gig was with an ad agency and we would do banners ads and the microsites that you would get to visit if you were bored enough to click on the banner.
- zedvox0
its made for awards. ego massage is a good thing.
- trooper0
Chances are Nike etc has been sold the site by some slick account manager... as a way of syphoning off some more cash from the client... i see this all of the time.
- people should start taking Nike less seriously.9832892398
- antistatic0
I guess their web stats are telling them it'sa good idea. It's obviously worth the effort
- killerqueen0
Trooper, you're an idiot.