Barnes & Noble, 3/4 — This Week -- New Look, New Show, New Coupons
Barnes & Noble has redesigned their “This Week” emails, which they—as you might have guessed—send out once a week. They keep a few of the design elements, like the gold “Save X%” boxes, but for the most part this is a wholesale redesign. The new design is slick, perhaps too slick. While the old design didn’t make the best use of space, in my opinion, it was very scannable. The new design is decidedly less scannable, especially the middle section with the three vertical items. The heatmapping that I’ve seen shows that the scannability is significantly dampened when you use columns like that.
In this message, Barnes & Noble also introduces subscribers to their new video series, Barnes & Noble Tagged, where the host runs through a bunch of notable books, with an occasional shout out to an album or video. The production values are high, but they use the video as just an alternative form of the newsletter—which is to say that you’re not going to learn much more about the products. It’s not like BuyTV’s product reviews where they go deeper into the product. Tagged is very surface level material, which is not necessarily a bad thing. After all, Barnes & Noble already offers video interviews with authors and other video content, which they smartly provide links to at the bottom of that opening section.
Here’s the new design (left) and the old design from a Feb. 26 email:
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Lillian Vernon, 3/4 — Go Green! Get a Free Gift!
Citing their commitment to the environment (and not their financial woes), Lillian Vernon alerts subscribers that they won’t be receiving their catalog in the mail anymore. Instead, they urge subscribers to check out their digital catalog. With the economy most likely already in recession and retail sales sinking fast (the latest Redbook numbers were awful), we may see more retailers discontinue their paper catalogs to save on printing and postage costs. Hopefully as more retailers publish e-catalogs we’ll see the technology options there improve significantly.
Sharper Image, 3/4 — Up to 60% off - Save now on hot products!
Although not as bad as Apple’s oopsy early last year where their email arrived as raw code (see Feb. 2, 2007 AM Inbox), this text-only Sharper Image email arrived without line breaks or clickable links in some cases depending on your email client. Check out the Feb. 28 AM Inbox to see what it was supposed to look like.
SUBJECTIVITY SCANNER:
Oriental Trading, 3/4 — $0 shipping on 100s of Easter values + don't pay until June
Saks Fifth Avenue, 3/4 — Exclusive Video with Giuseppe Zanotti
Gap, 3/4 — Top News: The Season's Shirts Are Here
Kmart, 3/4 — Up to 60% Off Spring Fashions for the Family
Banana Republic, 3/4 — Find the perfect pair... [promoting pants]
Ralph Lauren, 3/4 — Spring Brights - The Shirts Of The Season
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