Unmatchedstyle.com

How Much is Good Design Worth?

By now you’ve probably seen lots of copycat knockoffs of The Million Dollar Homepage (which actually should have a hyphen between “Million” and “Dollar,” if you want to be picky). They’re all over the place.

Well when none other than Shoemoney buys a link on one, it tends to separate it from the rest of the pack. What will also separate it is some savvy marketing, and evidently Link Experiment’s Brandon Rowe is pretty good at that — after all, it’s not everyone who gets a mention on Shoemoney. He’s made at least $2,860.02 since Shoemoney’s post, and that’s just for the higher bidders. Not a fortune, but definitely a good step toward making a million dollars and the Olympic team.

So when Brandon came to me a few days ago and offered to pay me for a review of Link Experiment, I considered it only because I knew he was already getting some good attention and that his idea was pretty interesting. After looking over the site again, I warned him that my review wouldn’t be terribly positive. I even told him the basics of what I’d be saying. He was fine with that, so I accepted the offer and started my review.

First, it’s obviously a copycat idea, with even sites like Baby Query getting into the paid-link game. That said, it is interesting, and he’s marketed it well so far. So I’ll give him points for that.

Second, it doesn’t seem like a long-term play to me. Unless it can pick up some real steam, with links changing out very frequently, it’s not going to get much return traffic which would make the links actually worth what people are paying for them. That could happen, but I’d say the odds are against it.

Finally, and this is why I think it’s a good topic for UMS, how much more successful could he be with a well-designed site? The design he has now isn’t terrible, but it could definitely be much better. Would that matter, though? Would a great design lend more legitimacy to the site and thus lead to more purchased links? What do you think?