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Tech Sector Corporate Web Designs: Best Of The Best
Over the past couple of months I went through all 1,088 websites in the tech sector that are traded publicly on the stock market. This was quite a tedious task that took me 3 different parts to do split up by letters (A-G, H-O, P-Z). The idea behind this was to see what companies that obviously have a technology background can do with their websites since they normally have large budgets to do so. You would think that most of the companies would have amazing websites, and it would be quite difficult to weed out the best. I was surprised by the number of the sites that really didn’t have anything impressive…from an aesthetic and even functional standpoint.
Now that I’ve looked through everything, I’d like to pick out the absolute 20 best of the best from the 135 that were picked out to be the best in their letter category:
What do you think about my selection? Do you believe these were the best out of the original 135? Did you have any other favorites?
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Derek
07/23/2007 3:07 pmAs someone in need of a new header for my site, it is interesting to see some of those designs. There are quite a few really nice designs in this list, with my favorites being F5, Safeguard and Viewpoint.
David Pitlyuk
07/23/2007 3:12 pmYeah they can be quite inspirational. My absolute favorites from the list are probably Omniture and Visual Science. I’ll get back to you on that e-mail shortly!
Scot Smith
07/23/2007 9:56 pmNice selection here. Been going through them now and must say some of them are pretty darned good.
Heather
07/24/2007 10:28 amDave, we are honored to be included amongst such visionary and innovative companies. We relaunched our site back in March with the intention to streamline our messaging and leverage our branding. Thanks for the recognition.
Anna Vester
07/24/2007 10:41 pmDave, you have done a great job picking out those websites. All of this sites look great. My favorites in this listing are Autodesk and Viewpoint sites. Out of curiosity, what criteria did you use in selecting these sites? (if you don’t mind me asking).
David Pitlyuk
07/24/2007 10:52 pmHi Anna, welcome to the blog! I was an Imaging and Digital Media major in college, but I think I’ve always had a good eye for design and what looks good. I’m pretty much using my own opinion on initial design aesthetic from first looks, I did not take functionality into consideration.
Jermayn Parker
07/25/2007 2:31 amA very good idea/ post and I think from the three lists you have indeed shown the best.
Guess the disappointing thing is that while they may be leading their fields in the tech field on the stock exchange they are not necessary doing the same in web design.
Kai
07/25/2007 2:07 pmDavid,
This is an interesting list of sites you have compiled here. Not sure what criteria you used for judging, but I must agree with Jermayn and say that most of these designs are not very well designed from a development and standards standpoint. Also, you like the Microsoft website over, say, the new Apple.com redesign? Not sure I am with you on this one.
David Pitlyuk
07/25/2007 2:31 pmWhen I looked at the sites, it was before Apple’s redesign (note the screenshot). Aesthetically, I still prefer Microsoft’s vs. Apple’s, but this is all opinion. If we’re looking at sites from a development and standards standpoint, it would be a different story.
tom
07/25/2007 7:55 pmIn response to Kai:
I am unsure of how one can say that these sites are not well designed from a development and standards standpoint. Consider the following:
1. Web Standards and Semantics: Unless there is no back-end (like .NET, Ruby, PHP, etc), it is extremely hard to have a site validate. It is best practice to validate during testing…it is nearly impossible to get a site to validate once the the front-end is integrated with a back-end system. Furthermore, if a site is being built in pure CSS (it seems most sites in the above list are), would not a proficient front-end developer make sure the site is somewhat semantic and without needless extra markup? The point of diminishing return must be recognized sites as well, sometimes trade-offs must be made, thus making a site 90% valid and semantic rather than 100% (even Apple’s site does not validate).
2. Development: I am assuming that ‘development’ in Kai’s instance refers to server side development. Behind most of the sites mentioned in this post rests a powerful piece of web software. I am sure that some very intelligent people architected the software/systems that drive some of these sites. Not to mention the team of developers/coders involved in making everything possible. I would hardly be able to look at a website like Microsoft’s and say the back-end or presentation layer(s) was not well architected, for they employ some of the greatest minds in the world (have you heard of Scott Guthrie?). Lastly, how can one tell if the custom software driving these site was architected or developed well? Now I’ve used decompilers, but is there some magical way seeing the all the UML charts, diagrams, or thousands of lines of C# source (or whatever was used) that made these sites possible? If someone can, I would say they are one notch above people who can read minds.
sam
06/06/2008 4:44 pmKai, Jermayn…
As the agency that produced the Safeguard site, I had to agree (a bit) with your comments. That being said, we updated the Safeguard site (and our in-house CMS) to include friendly urls, title overrides, protocol 0.9 sitemaps and a host of other improvements. The CMS also 301′d the old urls so as to not lose any search traction.
We’re also about to eat our own dog food and introduce our new web site (www.voveo.com) Our existing site is sadly 5 years old and built using toothpaste and shoe strings
BTW Dave, I’m flattered at the notion that these companies had unlimited budgets… I’m sure most of them did! But that comment put a smile on my face and my client’s! Thanks for the review!