For a moment, I thought I was in a disco, where the flashing lights can blind. Look…you can not have three moving messages on the home page—scrolling headlines, flashing developments, and little ad-like bites. While the information is fine, one glaring navigation error is still there from before. The all-important “articles and resources” section that appears on the home page is not part of the internal navigation, and does not appear on the site map, or the bottom page hyperlinks. This was pointed out last year. FOR SHAME! FOR SHAME! This is made even worse with the lack of a site search component. It is an improvement over previous iterations of Akerman.com, but the fact that nothing has been fixed in over a year is just lame.
The good news is that site content is being updated. Otherwise, to quote Sheila Broflovski (Kyle’s mom on South Park), “what-what-what??!!?” I’m not sure what is going on here. The home page does not match the interior. Browsers kept opening up when I went to different sections. This is what I wrote last year and it is still good today -- My initial thought was that the firm is developing something new and had basically abandoned this site during development. A lot of the info is there, but good luck finding it.
Slight improvement, but still quite bare. And still with those frames! More and better info is expected of a firm with nearly 600 attorneys and offices worldwide. Get with the millennium.
In case you were wondering what I thought of this home page—hated it. Dark and drab with my favorite (not) – the legal building column look (double-not). The home page “register” option is little more than an outdated guest book. It is slim on content and much of that is old. Get with the program. Three words for this site – blow it up.
It was not good last year; it is still one of the worst designed sites among the U.S. large firm sites. Terrible navigation and organization. An end-user’s bad dream. The best I can say is that it is still current, in regard to updating. The “Newsstand” is still the highlight, but that alone can not rescue things. Terrible usability. Most of the site’s page-view traffic is probably people trying to find stuff, not because they are so enthralled.
Lordy, lordy, I could not believe that dark, “say nothing” home page was still my introduction online to a firm that is known for doing so much pro-active marketing. On this day, the “upcoming seminars” shows nothing. Unlike the still-timely case studies from Ballard Spahr, the Cozen case studies were dated. And still with the lack of publications to read without signing up! The navigation and design still stink. At least the recruiting section is pretty good. Another firm that I know is better than the web site. I was sure that a new site would greet me when review time came along. I was wrong.
Memo to ESCM—you must have lost the memo about splash pages being about as “in” as …
Okay, as I clicked on “upcoming seminars”, I told myself there was no way that nothing would be listed for the THIRD YEAR IN A ROW. I was shocked! Shocked! It was empty once again. Make sure you do not lose that wonderful splash page (I’m being sarcastic, since you can not hear my voice). There were a couple of decent articles, but overall, it does not look like much has been updated in over a year…and considering that I hated the site last time, a better review score is not likely. Abandon ship!
One of the last of the stubborn! You still think the law firm web site is just about recruiting? Last year, I mentioned that I could learn more about the firm from Martindale. Which is great for M-H (especially when paying by the inch), but not for Mr. Web. My guess is next year’s summer associate class has a great shot at being taken to see Chitty-Chitty Bang-Bang when it opens on Broadway. Loved the movie growing up. Saw the show recently in London. A must-see. This is what happens when you provide me with little to say about your web site. I turn into Gene Shalit for goodness sake!
