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> b.) No direct link to the product website Except for the one in the sidebar that says "WakeMate Homepage". It's under a big white header labeled "Links". >

by tdavis 16y ago

> b.) No direct link to the product website Except for the one in the sidebar that says "WakeMate Homepage". It's under a big white header labeled "Links". > Since I'm on an iPad, it's orders of magnitude easier to simply hit the back button and write this comment... This is Hacker News. It self-selects for just hitting "back" and leaving a critical, half-accurate comment.

jasonkester 16y ago
You realize that this is a site full of entrepreneurs, who are here to talk about the business aspects of these links, right? If not, I'd recommend re-reading my comment in that light. As a product company, having somebody actually on your website and interested in finding out about your thing is extremely valuable. It doesn't matter that it's technically possible to find a link to the homepage. The fact that it's not trivial, as in linked from the logo, is what we're discussing here. If you have a blog about your product, every post needs to contain a way to ensnare random visitors who stumbled in from wherever. The ideal way to do this is a prominent sidebar or header with the product name, a 5-word description of what it does and why you need one, and a big shiny button labeled with your call to action. That's the "product blogging 101" bit that I mentioned above. That's why these guys need to fix their blog. They're bleeding interested visitors, and that's a big deal.
- tdavis 16y ago
  I completely agree with you: the blog should be better linked and branded. I run into blogs every day that have absolutely no way to get to the main site without changing the URL, and it's incredibly frustrating. I wasn't trying to disprove your overall argument regarding "product blogging 101", merely point out that your specific claim of having to change the URL is false (even if it is clearly non-trivial, relatively speaking, to find said link) and likely had no bearing on your decision to write your initial comment rather than investigate further. Frankly, your comment came off a bit snarky and holier-than-thou, which is what I was responding to in the first place. The basic merits of proper blog-site interlinking and branding were not meant to be brought up for debate. I take no issue with your points, merely the manner in which you chose to deliver them. Your follow-up here was much more thorough and useful.
  - delackner 16y ago
    And yet both he and I went through these steps: get intrigued, look around the page for a link to a product description, get frustrated, hand edit the url to just 'wakemate.com'. There is no sidebar for me reading in firefox. Maybe it is some fancy script that got binned by my various anti-junk plugins.
- borism 16y ago
  this is not Entrepreneur News
achompas 16y ago
I can reproduce this problem on my iPhone--there's no link sidebar. So he's not the "half accurate" comment in this thread right now.
annon 16y ago
The blog post itself has no links sidebar. You have to click on the blog header, and then search for the links sidebar, where there are very small links. Make some more prominent links, and it'd be great if you had a sidebar with an image of the product and a short description of what it was.
mkull 16y ago
I'm looking at the blog (in chrome) and definitely am not seeing a link to the homepage. I came to the comment section to make the same suggestion jasonkester already made (I manually went to www.wakemates.com to find out what the heck it was)

by tdavis 16y ago

jasonkester 16y ago

You realize that this is a site full of entrepreneurs, who are here to talk about the business aspects of these links, right? If not, I'd recommend re-reading my comment in that light. As a product company, having somebody actually on your website and interested in finding out about your thing is extremely valuable. It doesn't matter that it's technically possible to find a link to the homepage. The fact that it's not trivial, as in linked from the logo, is what we're discussing here. If you have a blog about your product, every post needs to contain a way to ensnare random visitors who stumbled in from wherever. The ideal way to do this is a prominent sidebar or header with the product name, a 5-word description of what it does and why you need one, and a big shiny button labeled with your call to action. That's the "product blogging 101" bit that I mentioned above. That's why these guys need to fix their blog. They're bleeding interested visitors, and that's a big deal.

tdavis 16y ago
I completely agree with you: the blog should be better linked and branded. I run into blogs every day that have absolutely no way to get to the main site without changing the URL, and it's incredibly frustrating. I wasn't trying to disprove your overall argument regarding "product blogging 101", merely point out that your specific claim of having to change the URL is false (even if it is clearly non-trivial, relatively speaking, to find said link) and likely had no bearing on your decision to write your initial comment rather than investigate further. Frankly, your comment came off a bit snarky and holier-than-thou, which is what I was responding to in the first place. The basic merits of proper blog-site interlinking and branding were not meant to be brought up for debate. I take no issue with your points, merely the manner in which you chose to deliver them. Your follow-up here was much more thorough and useful.
- delackner 16y ago
  And yet both he and I went through these steps: get intrigued, look around the page for a link to a product description, get frustrated, hand edit the url to just 'wakemate.com'. There is no sidebar for me reading in firefox. Maybe it is some fancy script that got binned by my various anti-junk plugins.
borism 16y ago
this is not Entrepreneur News

achompas 16y ago

I can reproduce this problem on my iPhone--there's no link sidebar. So he's not the "half accurate" comment in this thread right now.

annon 16y ago

The blog post itself has no links sidebar. You have to click on the blog header, and then search for the links sidebar, where there are very small links. Make some more prominent links, and it'd be great if you had a sidebar with an image of the product and a short description of what it was.

mkull 16y ago

I'm looking at the blog (in chrome) and definitely am not seeing a link to the homepage. I came to the comment section to make the same suggestion jasonkester already made (I manually went to www.wakemates.com to find out what the heck it was)