New Car Magazine Website Review
Car Magazine, is arguably the worlds finest publication for automotive enthusiasts. For decades they have been an institution and a standard bearer in terms of journalistic quality, photographic excellence and exquisite packaging. For many years whatever Car Magazine did with their publication, other magazine and journals followed. However while being an icon in the print world, Car Magazine were incredibly slow to embrace the online medium.
This changed about 18 months ago when they launched their first venture online. While the journalistic quality was very good and images by in large excellent, the design of the site was disappointing. It was not a bad website but not in keeping with the quality of design in the printed article. As I have stated before, integrating off line and online is the name of the game. Harrods do an excellent with their website, so I was glad to see yesterday that Car Magazine have spruced up their website.
First impressions are that it’s wider. The width has been upped and with it so has clarity. The homepage is now bigger but better structured and much easier to read. The images are better than before, and the top banner while simple, is effective and striking. The biggest criticism I had of the old site was the reliance of images to do the job of text. The new website gets rid of most unnecessary images and enhances accessibility and the user experience no end.
Criticisms of the site would be around structure mainly. Too many areas of unnecessary whitespace give the impression that it is not quite the finished article. The homepage is too long, and trimming the whitespace fat and perhaps going to multiple column layout would trim it up by 20%. The choice of font is too small for a serif face like Georgia and readability is a bit difficult as a result. My other major criticism is that the editors letter is actually an image. Get the designers back and make them create it in text - no shortcuts!
The most annoying aspect for me is arguably outside the scope of the designer. The presenting of 2 flash advertisements for competing car brands is unprofessional. They would never be advertised on the same page in a magazine and so should be the case online. The advertising providers should ensure that while a manufacturer is being displayed in box 1, an insurer or finance company is displayed in box 2. Minor details? Maybe, but Car Magazine built its stellar reputation on going the extra mile so the website should be no different.
So while Car Magazine have added a new Green cars section to their website, the revamp proves that in the modern world you don’t have to be frugal with the design. Overall it’s a welcome revamp, but not perfect yet. Lets give the designers a week or two to fix the bugs before declaring it a success.
Posted 17.12.07
April 10th, 2008 at 9:31 pm
I’ve enjoyed reading the magazine in the past and have to agree with you that it is definitely at the top for design and layout when it comes to other car magazines.
I’ve never actually checked out the website before but after reading your review I just had to check it out. The website leaves a lot to be desired in the way of design, it’s almost there but not quite. I hope someone from there design team reads your post and decides to use some of your suggestions.