Ramanujan Redux

I’ve just been thinking about better ways to brand a site and to get people clicking on linkrolls. Some linkrolls are longer than the number of books an average person reads in their lifetime.

Wouldn’t a logo search service be useful? People respond better to imagery on a page than the name of a site. I don’t know how many people would click on RamanujanRedux if they saw it on someone’s blogroll–they’d likely ignore it.

Internal media networks like Gawker and Rudius have recognizable imagery that define the sites on their system visually (GaijinSmash for the win!). Internally, the sites do well. But for external blogrolls, do people really click on the site after the first time?

Some reasons why logos might work:

1) It shows that you care enough about the site to put the logo trademark on the back.
2) It provides a visual stimulus after glossing your eyes over with gallons of text.
3) A lot of people judge sites on their first reaction. If the logo was displayed alongside the Google search result, it could raise a decent amount of interest.
4) It provides an anchor image to associate with your site, so that your name doesn’t easily get forgotten.

For example, for my Cal football site, would seeing this image on another site’s blogroll you were visiting increase your interest at crossing over to check it out? Because I’m guessing you wouldn’t if it was just the title. Images matter.

Anyway, what I’ve been saying is that it seems clickthrough rates for links outside your network are pretty atrocious. Some sprucing might need to be done to keep raising the bar on ratcheting up the importance of searching for brands and attracting attention at first glance. Make the Internet prettier.