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Today’s annual iMedia Connection article is (in years past) the most read article of the year because readers (and authors) like me love the joy of discovering unique / beautiful / hilarious / branded / insanely creative websites.  In the “10 killer websites worth watching” article, I got a chance to write about 2 of my favorite sites:

Brand Name: Wacom
Agency/Site Creator: eROI
URL: www.pencollective.com

What is unusual and effective about this website?
A lot of sites try to personalize the message, but the Pen Collective site is different — the highly personalized stories are the messages. The site offers the opportunity to meet such people as Mark, an illustrator who prefers his pen to his girlfriend, or Alex, who will show you how she uses her pen to remove the cellulite from her sister’s wedding photos. The site also allows other users to share their own story with the world and become part of the Collective.  Read the full story >>

Brand Name: Converse
Agency/Site Creator: Anomaly
URL: www.thisistheindexpage.com
 
What is unusual and effective about this website?
This site connects so completely with the nostalgic high school kid in me. It’s like a Will Ferrell movie where a 16-year-old jock or a 45-year-old creative can find their own experience and sense of humor in the content and the way it’s executed. This site differentiates itself from all others with its full-screen videos, never-ending supply of full-screen background images upon refresh, clever URLs with the implied promise of humor and entertainment in each of the individual video vignettes within the overall campaign website. Content is king and Converse nailed it with this site. The “I’m too hot for you” attitude, voice, mannerisms of the girl in OutofYourLeagueGirl.com reminds me exactly of several girls in my year at Wootton High School in Maryland.  Read the full story >>

One last thing, David Friedman of Avenue A | Razorfish introduced me to a hilarious site called www.iliketotallyloveit.com – check out the site, but first read his creative review of it.

In the same week, I was asked to do 2 different creative reviews after a hiatus of at least 6 months of not writing them.  The first one “Can you tell me how to get to SesameStreet.org?” is complete and was really fun to write because I could involve my kids as a focus group.  This next one is the one I need your help on.  I have to choose 2 sites to write about – the best of the year that eROI designed and developed AND the best of the year that any other brand or agency developed. 

I feel confident with my choice for another brand developing a site: Converse’s ThisIsTheIndexPage.com.

Please comment on which of these 2 eROI-developed sites I should review – I have totally different reasons for submitting one versus the other:  Zinio blog  … or … Wacom’s Pen Collective

Seriously – let me know by a quick note in the comment field below.

While my 6 year-old daughter Grace didn’t write my Creative Review for SesameStreet.org, she definitely was the entire focus group for the writing assignment.  Apparently, the entire site (including strategy, focus groups, usability experts, content creation, design, development, and production) cost $14 million.  Fellow eROI blogger, Dylan Boyd, shared this fact with me and we were both stunned at the price tag.  However, the following weekend, Grace and my youngest daughter Emma proved the money for SesameStreet.org was worth it, as it was exactly what kids wanted (not for adults who think they are big kids).

Here is my Creative Review published in iMedia Connection a few days ago:

“The tough task of writing a review for the iconic brand of Sesame Street’s new website melted away when I included my six-year-old daughter Grace to put the site to the test. The site’s primary target audience is clearly focused on young kids, so watching Grace interact with the site was much more informative than my initial attempts to be a big kid on the site. Here is what I learned: Sesame Street did its homework. When it comes to good content, kids are far more patient than adults. Grace watched the first two minutes of the homepage Flash animation of Bert introducing the elements of the site. She and her three-year-old sister Emma began talking back to the screen and getting very animated about all the recognizable characters. Where do you think Grace clicked first? Games, of course. Kids love games and smartly, SesameStreet.org has “Games” as the intuitive first choice in the top navigation.”

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