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An idea for Muti

May 23rd, 2008 · Comments

A quick idea I thought I’d jot down for Muti, probably South Africa’s most popular social link sharing and voting site.

I imagine that one of the larger problems facing these voting type sites is that once the user has clicked on a link, he’s left Muti and needs to come back to cast his vote.

If I was to put on my emarketer’s hat (one of my more comfortable hats), i see the action of voting to be the equivalent of a conversion. The more votes, the more accurate the relevance. Leaving the page and needing to return to vote is clearly an obstacle in the “conversion funnel”. Why not bring the voting functionality a little closer to the user?

My simple idea:
First, take a look at Modernista’s website (don’t worry, this will launch in another window so you can come back to read the rest..).

Now, what I propose is that when you click to a story from Muti, the next page, has a similar css overlay with a simple up and down (if down voting is allowed) arrows. That way, you’re not required to return to the Muti page until you’ve decided to vote on the content.

This may be seen as a little loss of control on the user’s part, but I think that in the overall scheme of things, it’s more valuable than irritating. also, a little [x] could just be shown to allow you to close the Muti layer should you wish.

Anyway, that’s my idea, down on the virtual napkin.

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  • What about handling it the way Google Images does - keep a frame at the top containing voting mechanism and allow user to "close frame" when he wants to concentrate on the site. Best of both worlds really. (Disclaimer: haven't clicked through to your example site - so maybe repeating your idea - I'm passing by really.)
  • @thescott I know its not exactly what you want but below each post on muti is a link entitled "new window". I have my browser set to open new windows in new tabs. My normal habit in muti is to open the hot page, click on several of the "new window" links of stuff I find interesting. Then I flip through the tabs and read them and finally end up back on the muti tab and then I vote on the ones I like. This seems obvious and intuitive to me but I take your point.
  • agreed.

    the more i learn about what we put up there online (especially when it comes
    to consumer generated stuff), and watch real users use these things, I see
    that things like tabs, and new windows etc are just not an option. The wider
    market has limited attention span, and in general, are not "contributors" to
    the whole social thing, rather just "passers-by". Hence the proposal to be a
    bit more... how do i say "in your face" without saying "in your face"?



    2008/5/23 Disqus <>:
  • auric
    Or (since Muti mostly links to WP blogs) you could create a WP plugin that reads the referring url, and creates a "Vote" button if the visitor came from Muti - otherwise, it creates a "submit this" button.

    Same effect, no load on Muti ... think about it :)
  • Very cool idea auric! Definitely something we should consider for the next release of the Wordpress plugin.
  • Btw sorry I neglected to mention, we can't just use a "CSS overlay" we need to effectively use an "iframe" for this which would basically keep the user inside of Muti.co.za (strictly speaking).
  • Doesn't modernista use css? (disclaimer: my knowledge of the inner workings
    of HTML and CSS is limited)

    2008/5/23 Disqus <>:
  • Yes they are using CSS but in combination with a variety of technologies - if you look at the URL all that is happening is they are wrapping the Wikipedia inside of their own site.
  • Thanks for the post, this has actually been discussed by us before (internally) but it's a good thing you raised it again so that we can revisit the discussion.

    My personal views (not necessarily reflecting the views of the other team members) are as follows. At the end of the day the HTML "target" attribute has been deprecated since HTML 4.01 (which was released back in 1999). The idea is that the user is in control of their own browsing experience. If they want something to open up in the same tab and leave the current page, they just do a normal click. When they want to stay on that page, they can open up separate tabs, but at their free will. The "target" attribute (or opening the site inside of an "iframe") essentially forces the user to do what the site author wants him/her to do.

    What I normally do with Muti is I open up links in separate tabs (simple middle-click in Firefox) and then I just flip back to Muti when I'm ready to vote.

    Would certainly like to take the discussion and hear your views about this further though. :)
  • yeah, I understand that there's certain concerns about both user, and W3C
    standards.

    My feeling on tabs is that they're used effectively by only a small slice of
    users, probably all muti users, but there must be some sort of intention to
    grow the site out into the "wild"?

    At the end of the day, i guess it's all about standards v growing the
    service. Not that you can only grow the service by not sticking to
    standards. but for this specific idea it may be the case.


    2008/5/23 Disqus <>:
  • From a marketing point of view what you are saying is probably entirely valid but personally I don't feel we should compromise with generally accepted standards and best practices. I really don't want to be the standards nazi here but I do think we should encourage and educate users on how to use their browsers optimally. But that’s just my point of view. :)
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