Wesbite Research - Beyonce

The first website I decided to analyse was Beyonce's. She is an incredibly popular artist and I was interested to see how she makes her website as effective.

Content:

When the webpage opens the first thing you see is either images or videos.  As you hover over the images/videos writing is revealed that is either titled 'My Life' or 'My Work'. And when you click on one of the images/videos, it lightboxes and the image/video is shown in a larger size and the user has the option of sharing that image/video on their personal social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest. 

• Home Page 
• Album Page - has a list of all her albums and each individual album has a link to the songs, videos, images, credits and documentaries 
• Song Page - has a track list from all her albums. The viewer can listen to the released songs or buy them.
• Video Page - has the videos to all her official music videos 
• DVD Page - has the video from all her tours that can only be purchased 
• Fragrance Page - has links to all of her fragrances
• Shop Page - links to all her merchandise 
• #Beygood Page - links to all her charitable work and all the organisations she supports 

Purpose:

Beyonce's record label are Columbia Records and they are responsible for maintaining her website. While Beyonce may provide some of the images or videos it is the record label's job to make it available on the website. I think the main thing they tried to achieve with this website (especially though the function of the home page) is to make the viewer feel closer to Beyonce; this is done through the use of images and videos that display her private life; which is something Beyonce has been very secretive about it in the past. Other parts of the website focus on promoting Beyonce's music through the use of YouTube clips or sound clips. They also focus on increasing sales through the use of the merchandise; this allows fans to buy items to showcase their love for Beyonce or even buy items to add to collections e.g. albums. However, due to the fact Beyonce is now a mature artist and her music has been around for over a decade her website becomes more natural. She is already an established artist so it's no longer about trying to create an image or create a fan base; it's about giving her existing fan base more ways to know her. This is done through the use of documentaries where Beyonce comments on her thoughts and feelings while creating her numerous studio albums.

Information:

The website is updated daily with the new images or videos that Beyonce shares on her Instagram page. The images also allow the viewer to know where in Beyonce is and what she is doing. Any new albums/singles/perfumes/merchandise are updated as soon as they are publicly released. The website does not however have a 'Tour' page; as soon as she decides to do a tour the page will become live on the website. 

Music:

All the singles that have been released individually are available to listen for free on the website but the singles that weren't released individually have to be purchased, this is so that the artist can make a profit. However, the album is available to listen for free on YouTube. 

Style:

The style of the website is very much symbolic of Beyonce as an artist and a person. It captures her elegance and her simplicity through the use of a black and white layout; this expresses her maturity as an artist and as a person e.g. her being a mother. However, it doesn't really fit with the 'Pop' genre as you would expect to see a more vibrant use of colour. The layout of the website makes it modern and edgy, this is done through the use of the Instagram style home page; so while the website maintains it's elegance it is still fun enough to appeal to a slightly younger audience. 

Navigation:

The navigation on this website is relatively simple. There is a tab on the left hand side of the page; when clicked it opens up bigger on the screen and gives the user options for pages to navigate to. Once the user has looked through the pages and decided they want to return to the home page they click on Beyonce's name that is visible at the top of every page. Any links are opened in another tab so that once the user has finished viewing that page they can simply close the tab and go back to browsing the website. 

I really like this website for it's elegance and simplicity. I think the basic use of colours is very effective for the type of artist Beyonce is and for the level of her success. This website has taught me that simplicity is important however, because I am making a website for a new artist it cannot be as simple as this one; I have to offer more in order to attract an audience. I also like the idea of a navigation tab instead of a bar but I will see what is more common on other websites before deciding on what to use in my own.