Amazon succumbs?

OK, call me crazy and non-observant, but I’ve been holiday shopping on Amazon’s new interface for days now and just noticed an odd thing: They’ve got a gen-u-wine ad on the home page. A really, truly, somebody-besides-Amazon-is-buying-space ad on their front page.

A glance at their advertising section, and I see they’re selling “best of breed brands” on the home page, product pages, and “Thank You” page. (And there are more ads below, from “trusted partners,” but Amazon’s flirted with that kind of stuff before.)

Dammit.

Here’s why this is significant: Those of us in the business of information architectures, content strategies, and web marketing tend to use Amazon.com as an example. As in, “See? If Amazon.com is doing it, and we’re recommending it, must the right thing to do, right?” (insert nods from the audience)

Amazon.com has gotten an amazing number of things right, and probably had more influence on the shape of Web standards than 99% of all commercial websites. And one of its hard-and-fast rules: Home page real estate is far too rare and valuable to be sold to an outside advertiser, unless all/part of your business was selling adspace.

Granted, the company’s massive catalog is sorta one big ad, but those ads were for Amazon.com transactions. Amazon’s not selling this movie–it’s not even in theatres until nearly Christmas. Online ad-wise, this must be the equivalent of a SuperBowl ad.

This probably makes perfect sense from Amazon’s point of view. They’re massive, they’re continuing to develop an already-strong editorial/informational presence. (If you don’t believe that, think of the last time you researched a potential consumer product purchase online. If you didn’t check out the customer reviews on Amazon, you missed a bet.) Most online infosources have an advertising revenue stream; why not Amazon?

What worries me is that Amazon is big enough to do that. Most aren’t, and I wonder how many business owners in the midst of a redesign will make the distinction? A corporate home page has about 800×600 pixels to engage visitors and turn them into would-be customers. Return on marketing investment (ROMI) is a whole lot more nebulous than cold, hard, advertiser cash in hand from a home page ad.

–sigh– I can just hear the arguments starting now. Thanks a lot, Amazon.

As a consumer, it kinda rubs me the wrong way, too. Up until now I looked at all the boxes and graphics and stuff on the page, because it was likely to pertain to me. Now I’ll be developing that “blindspot” thing that Web visitors get: If it’s blinking, boxed and graphical, ignore it…and anything else in that column.

While the rest of the Web world is concentrating on building ads that don’t look like ads, Amazon’s marching to a different drummer. Again. I should probably lighten up and go with it, start recommending discrete home page advertising for my clients. But right now, what I’m mostly feeling is irritation.

–sigh–

Share on Facebook

Related posts:

1. Hooray for Amazon.com Amazon.com has decided to tackle one of the banes of my existence:...
2. Kindling myths Just read Roy Blount Jr’s worries over Amazon’s new Kindle 2 in...