[thelist] European websites: inter-country design differences?

[Caren Spencer-Smith]

Francois Jordaan wrote:

> I'm trying to find out whether there are significant design differences (and
> design preferences amongst web users) between websites of different European
> countries.

> On the other hand, if anyone believes very strongly that there are no
> significant differences whatsoever, then I'd like to know, too.

I had not taken the opportunity to do this for a while, but looking at
the international sites for Amazon.com
<http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/stores/static/-/gateway/international-gateway/ref=gw_subnav_in/002-5006548-2281611>
demonstrates subtle differences between the site designs for the
different countries. I do not know if this is based on specific
research, but suspect the sites are responsive to feedback from their
specific target audiences.

As a note, when I did this as part of a project about 3 years ago, the
differences were much more significant. The US site was much more
complex than the UK site, colors were different, etc. Now the two are
very similar. If you can find other sites with different international
pages to do a similar comparison, it may off at least anecdotal evidence
of local preferences.

Caren