7 ms·

Wow, I just visited their website and it's awful. I saw a total of 4 or 5 different popup widgets[1]. What a nightmare. [1]: https://i.imgur.com/EMdObEd.jpg ht

Wow, I just visited their website and it's awful. I saw a total of 4 or 5 different popup widgets[1]. What a nightmare. [1]: https://i.imgur.com/EMdObEd.jpg https://i.imgur.com/EMdObEd.jpg

devopsproject 9y ago
Makes $125,000 a month. maybe they know something we don't?
- danvoell 9y ago
  Seriously though Kyle if you are reading this, figure out how to time or space out your pop-ups. It's a little intense.
- brndnmtthws 9y ago
  My thoughts exactly.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- kerkeslager 9y ago
  Maybe what's good for business isn't always good for the user, and the only reason anyone thinks capitalism works this way is that it makes some people rich. :)
- dboreham 9y ago
  125k rev at, say, 15% margin is less than 20k/mo income. Decent for a one person company I suppose but hardly untold riches.
dsacco 9y ago
Awful is subjective. I get your point here (I personally wouldn't enjoy using that website either), but websites like this one are optimized to convert the greatest portion of the target demographic. It's very simple statistics. You can't please (or convert) all users, but you can convert enough of them to be a (highly!) profitable business. HN users are usually a very poor demographic to optimize for. It's a small demographic, for starters, and it's a very sensitive one (as evidenced by your comment). On the other hand my girlfriend, parents and probably all friends not working in tech wouldn't even notice it (where notice means "perceptibly annoying enough to have an explicit thought about it"). A lot of people honestly just don't care if the website is bloated or has numerous prompts to subscribe or chat. The users of this site evidently put up with it because it provides them with enough utility that they're not going to nitpick. The creators of the site have likely researched the market and business model enough to know that this is close to the ideal for maximizing profit without sacrificing utility. The website has hit market equilibrium.
- castis 9y ago
  I bet OP understands that personal feelings are subjective. That website makes someone a whole bunch of money. That doesn't mean that website isn't awful.
  - dsacco 9y ago
    The website's profitability doesn't assure that it isn't awful, no (pure capitalism is not a moral framework). But the consensus of a lot of people who choose to use it sort of does mean it isn't awful, if you're trying to ascribe some sort of objectivity to that adjective (and I don't agree you can). This is like bikeshedding the definitions of privacy, DRM, net neutrality, etc. Most people just don't give a shit, no matter how loud the minority is that demonizes things like throwing a newsletter subscription popup on a website.
    - castis 9y ago
      The philosophical pillar you're standing on doesn't stop me from saying that this website is subjectively awful.
      - softawre 9y ago
        A website serves a purpose, to create income. If removing some of the modals would reduce their income, then having them is subjectively better than not. I think you need a new word to describe your (valid, in a way) opinion.
        castis 9y ago
        If the only thing that mattered in this world was income then you might have had a point. Thinking others should change their opinion because you don't understand subjectivity is absurd.
    - skummetmaelk 9y ago
      Exactly. Like when people don't give a shit about audio quality and end up damaging their ears because of speakers with poor frequency responses. Most people would care if they knew the difference, they do not. It is up to those who know to tell them, to make a stance and denounce the shit.
avitzurel 9y ago
Talking from my personal experience in the travel industry (6 years senior engineer @ a travel startup). This is really common practice and I hated every bit of it. Everyone is looking at the big guys like Expedia and Booking.com and those are really pushy. You can see them popping up every thing in a popup. You're looking at a room and you see "1500 people are looking @ this room now", everything, just to get you to book. This case is a bit extreme, even in those standards, but not the first time I see something like it.
- brndnmtthws 9y ago
  Can't we strive for better rather than just rinsing and repeating the same bad UX and shove-it-down-your-throat tactics?
  - dsacco 9y ago
    Most users do not care and do not agree with you that it is bad, as evidenced by the continuing dominance of these practices. What you have here is a crusade based upon your personal feelings, not the objective utility of the website. And the result is that we now have a discussion going centered around common marketing strategies instead of the website itself and its service. As a counterpoint, I don't particularly find this website egregious. If you feel strongly about things like this, don't use those websites, or build your own alternative (though a lack of popups will not be a competitive advantage). Note that I'm not saying this to insult you. I'm saying this because your comment comes across to me as myopic and lacking in self-awareness. You're not the target demographic if these things put you off, but that doesn't mean it's productive for you to call them "bad." HN users frequently wonder how people build profitable advertising, product or consulting-driven profitable businesses, and the answer is (in part) that those people were okay with doing things that others find disagreeble. That's an inevitability when you have outspoken groups like e.g. those who believe all software should be free and open source.
    - tsunamifury 9y ago
      If it works it doesn't mean they like it. They can go with it and hate it.
damianmakki 9y ago
Designer of SA here. Kyle and I have talked a LOT about this and have gone back and forth on it. I'll say while we're not personally fans of the widgets/popups, they're there for a reason. A couple things here: - Say what you will about performance and UX, the fact is that it has (dramatically) increased conversions and bookings. - If we were optimizing for HN, the site would look and perform much differently. The target audience - as others have mentioned - aren't repulsed by the popups. Go read through Kyle's interview on IH - a lot of what he does with SA is grounded in quick iteration and "moving fast." I can't tell you how how many different techniques/widgets/plugins/etc we've implemented (and subsequently canned) over the past few years.
- King-Aaron 9y ago
  > Say what you will about performance and UX, the fact is that it has (dramatically) increased conversions and bookings. This is what really irks me about the design industry of late. It's become an overly self-critical echo chamber of people pushing this idea of what user experience "should be", yet totally miss the critical business decisioning behind it and ignore the fact that it drives conversions.
  - trevor-e 9y ago
    Totally agree. I read an article the other week where a UX/UI person redesigned booking.com's front page as a case study, and while it looked nice I bet it would have made the company far less money. Of course everyone would love to have their website look like Airbnb's, but most don't have the luxury of being propped up by VC money. I think a lot of designers undervalue the importance of SEO as well.
saimiam 9y ago
You're missing something really fundamental here - You are visiting this site with a dispassionate eye of an observer. The usual demographic visiting a travel site is a lot more invested in actually finding a travel deal that works for them. Let's take an extreme example - say you were thirsty for water right now. Would you take a "cold enough" bottle of water or would you wait for the perfectly ice-cold bottle of flavored water with brain boosting ions? The average visitor who goes to a website to transact is like the thirsty you. They are willing to overlook the "cold enough-ness" of the water as it were because they need their thirst sated. We aren't special because we are users of Hacker News. We are special because we are seeing the website from the vantage point of a bystander.
sgustard 9y ago
I find articles like "how we built our startup" on HN to be hugely valuable. The fact that the founders of said startup participate in the discussion makes it doubly so. But every such post is marred by variants of "your website sucks" trolls. Eventually that kind of thing will make HN poorer by driving away the creators. It's fun to be a critic, but I also know what it's like to have a job and a family to feed.
- AndrewKemendo 9y ago
  Literally how HN operates, it's part of the culture. Here's the famous Drew Houston post about Dropbox: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863

Wow, I just visited their website and it's awful. I saw a total of 4 or 5 different popup widgets[1]. What a nightmare. [1]: https://i.imgur.com/EMdObEd.jpg https://i.imgur.com/EMdObEd.jpg

devopsproject 9y ago

Makes $125,000 a month. maybe they know something we don't?

danvoell 9y ago
Seriously though Kyle if you are reading this, figure out how to time or space out your pop-ups. It's a little intense.
brndnmtthws 9y ago
My thoughts exactly.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
kerkeslager 9y ago
Maybe what's good for business isn't always good for the user, and the only reason anyone thinks capitalism works this way is that it makes some people rich. :)
dboreham 9y ago
125k rev at, say, 15% margin is less than 20k/mo income. Decent for a one person company I suppose but hardly untold riches.

dsacco 9y ago

Awful is subjective. I get your point here (I personally wouldn't enjoy using that website either), but websites like this one are optimized to convert the greatest portion of the target demographic. It's very simple statistics. You can't please (or convert) all users, but you can convert enough of them to be a (highly!) profitable business. HN users are usually a very poor demographic to optimize for. It's a small demographic, for starters, and it's a very sensitive one (as evidenced by your comment). On the other hand my girlfriend, parents and probably all friends not working in tech wouldn't even notice it (where notice means "perceptibly annoying enough to have an explicit thought about it"). A lot of people honestly just don't care if the website is bloated or has numerous prompts to subscribe or chat. The users of this site evidently put up with it because it provides them with enough utility that they're not going to nitpick. The creators of the site have likely researched the market and business model enough to know that this is close to the ideal for maximizing profit without sacrificing utility. The website has hit market equilibrium.

castis 9y ago
I bet OP understands that personal feelings are subjective. That website makes someone a whole bunch of money. That doesn't mean that website isn't awful.
- dsacco 9y ago
  The website's profitability doesn't assure that it isn't awful, no (pure capitalism is not a moral framework). But the consensus of a lot of people who choose to use it sort of does mean it isn't awful, if you're trying to ascribe some sort of objectivity to that adjective (and I don't agree you can). This is like bikeshedding the definitions of privacy, DRM, net neutrality, etc. Most people just don't give a shit, no matter how loud the minority is that demonizes things like throwing a newsletter subscription popup on a website.
  - castis 9y ago
    The philosophical pillar you're standing on doesn't stop me from saying that this website is subjectively awful.
    - softawre 9y ago
      A website serves a purpose, to create income. If removing some of the modals would reduce their income, then having them is subjectively better than not. I think you need a new word to describe your (valid, in a way) opinion.
      - castis 9y ago
        If the only thing that mattered in this world was income then you might have had a point. Thinking others should change their opinion because you don't understand subjectivity is absurd.
  - skummetmaelk 9y ago
    Exactly. Like when people don't give a shit about audio quality and end up damaging their ears because of speakers with poor frequency responses. Most people would care if they knew the difference, they do not. It is up to those who know to tell them, to make a stance and denounce the shit.

avitzurel 9y ago

Talking from my personal experience in the travel industry (6 years senior engineer @ a travel startup). This is really common practice and I hated every bit of it. Everyone is looking at the big guys like Expedia and Booking.com and those are really pushy. You can see them popping up every thing in a popup. You're looking at a room and you see "1500 people are looking @ this room now", everything, just to get you to book. This case is a bit extreme, even in those standards, but not the first time I see something like it.

brndnmtthws 9y ago
Can't we strive for better rather than just rinsing and repeating the same bad UX and shove-it-down-your-throat tactics?
- dsacco 9y ago
  Most users do not care and do not agree with you that it is bad, as evidenced by the continuing dominance of these practices. What you have here is a crusade based upon your personal feelings, not the objective utility of the website. And the result is that we now have a discussion going centered around common marketing strategies instead of the website itself and its service. As a counterpoint, I don't particularly find this website egregious. If you feel strongly about things like this, don't use those websites, or build your own alternative (though a lack of popups will not be a competitive advantage). Note that I'm not saying this to insult you. I'm saying this because your comment comes across to me as myopic and lacking in self-awareness. You're not the target demographic if these things put you off, but that doesn't mean it's productive for you to call them "bad." HN users frequently wonder how people build profitable advertising, product or consulting-driven profitable businesses, and the answer is (in part) that those people were okay with doing things that others find disagreeble. That's an inevitability when you have outspoken groups like e.g. those who believe all software should be free and open source.
  - tsunamifury 9y ago
    If it works it doesn't mean they like it. They can go with it and hate it.

damianmakki 9y ago

Designer of SA here. Kyle and I have talked a LOT about this and have gone back and forth on it. I'll say while we're not personally fans of the widgets/popups, they're there for a reason. A couple things here: - Say what you will about performance and UX, the fact is that it has (dramatically) increased conversions and bookings. - If we were optimizing for HN, the site would look and perform much differently. The target audience - as others have mentioned - aren't repulsed by the popups. Go read through Kyle's interview on IH - a lot of what he does with SA is grounded in quick iteration and "moving fast." I can't tell you how how many different techniques/widgets/plugins/etc we've implemented (and subsequently canned) over the past few years.

King-Aaron 9y ago
> Say what you will about performance and UX, the fact is that it has (dramatically) increased conversions and bookings. This is what really irks me about the design industry of late. It's become an overly self-critical echo chamber of people pushing this idea of what user experience "should be", yet totally miss the critical business decisioning behind it and ignore the fact that it drives conversions.
- trevor-e 9y ago
  Totally agree. I read an article the other week where a UX/UI person redesigned booking.com's front page as a case study, and while it looked nice I bet it would have made the company far less money. Of course everyone would love to have their website look like Airbnb's, but most don't have the luxury of being propped up by VC money. I think a lot of designers undervalue the importance of SEO as well.

saimiam 9y ago

You're missing something really fundamental here - You are visiting this site with a dispassionate eye of an observer. The usual demographic visiting a travel site is a lot more invested in actually finding a travel deal that works for them. Let's take an extreme example - say you were thirsty for water right now. Would you take a "cold enough" bottle of water or would you wait for the perfectly ice-cold bottle of flavored water with brain boosting ions? The average visitor who goes to a website to transact is like the thirsty you. They are willing to overlook the "cold enough-ness" of the water as it were because they need their thirst sated. We aren't special because we are users of Hacker News. We are special because we are seeing the website from the vantage point of a bystander.

sgustard 9y ago

I find articles like "how we built our startup" on HN to be hugely valuable. The fact that the founders of said startup participate in the discussion makes it doubly so. But every such post is marred by variants of "your website sucks" trolls. Eventually that kind of thing will make HN poorer by driving away the creators. It's fun to be a critic, but I also know what it's like to have a job and a family to feed.

AndrewKemendo 9y ago
Literally how HN operates, it's part of the culture. Here's the famous Drew Houston post about Dropbox: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8863