Ernie Ball''s new website is more navigable and packs some interesting reading
San Luis Obispo, CA (March 26, 2008) -- A few weeks ago, when I was working on an article about Ernie Ball''s new Ball Family Reserve instruments, I struggled with the fact that the Ernie Ball and Music Man websites were rather difficult to navigate. "Hey, cut them a break," I told myself, "they''re in the guitar business, not the website business." So when I received an e-mail from the company yesterday, I got an eerie feeling that they had been reading my mind. Said Brian Ball:
"This new Music Man website has been a long time coming – and should be the perfect tool to allow us to maintain the interactive consumer and dealer relationships that we try to nurture via every other facet of the company. It’s an exciting change for the company and our Music Man fans.”
When I visited the new music-man.com, I immediately went to the part of the website we probably all use the most -- the instruments. Previously, I had found it impossible to find the pages (if they existed) describing the new instruments. Now, I was greeted with 24 colorful pictures of guitars and basses, each with a link leading to a thorough product description with multiple pictures. But I''m not about to give too hearty of a pat on the back to a company that is just doing what is expected of their website -- they have the standard news, artists and dealers pages as well.
However, the rest of the website does go beyond the standard major manufacturer offerings. There''s a page simply called The Process, with big photos of various stages of the building process and short descriptions of what''s going on. The History page is a large slideshow of company milestones with a timeline underneath, and the BFR Blog tracks the locations of Ball Family Reserve instruments. The Media Gallery features videos of Ernie Ball artists playing their instruments, though there was some considerable load time for the embedded player.
Ernie Ball Music Man fans can check out the site at music-man.com.
"This new Music Man website has been a long time coming – and should be the perfect tool to allow us to maintain the interactive consumer and dealer relationships that we try to nurture via every other facet of the company. It’s an exciting change for the company and our Music Man fans.”
When I visited the new music-man.com, I immediately went to the part of the website we probably all use the most -- the instruments. Previously, I had found it impossible to find the pages (if they existed) describing the new instruments. Now, I was greeted with 24 colorful pictures of guitars and basses, each with a link leading to a thorough product description with multiple pictures. But I''m not about to give too hearty of a pat on the back to a company that is just doing what is expected of their website -- they have the standard news, artists and dealers pages as well.
However, the rest of the website does go beyond the standard major manufacturer offerings. There''s a page simply called The Process, with big photos of various stages of the building process and short descriptions of what''s going on. The History page is a large slideshow of company milestones with a timeline underneath, and the BFR Blog tracks the locations of Ball Family Reserve instruments. The Media Gallery features videos of Ernie Ball artists playing their instruments, though there was some considerable load time for the embedded player.
Ernie Ball Music Man fans can check out the site at music-man.com.
