Links are great, and we all use them in print, videos, and on webpages. At least they are great until a link turns out to go some place other than you thought. That is what happened to the publishers of Lyckoslanten (which translates as “the lucky coin”). This is a magazine published for children ages 9-12 by Swedbank, a major Swedish savings bank. It contains articles geared to help kids learn to manage their money. Link to the story published in Swedish.

In a recent issue, someone decided to do an article featuring a list of the 10 most expensive internet addresses sold. Unfortunately, it seems no one bothered to actually check those web addresses before printing the article. Turns out one of them goes to a site that sells streaming porn. Not what you really want to include in a magazine teaching fiscal responsibility to kids.

I doubt this will be enough of a faux pas to kill the 83 year old magazine, but it certainly was a major PR disaster for the bank.

Of course, all this could have been avoided if someone had actually tested the links before printing them. So the good word of the day is to always proof links that you include in any of your materials. And don’t just read the link — actually click on it, or if in print, copy the link, paste it into a browser and make sure the webpage that shows up is what you intended. It won’t always be as bad as in the case above, but even one missed character can turn a perfectly working link into an error message. And that is certainly not what you want for your readers or viewers to experience.

Also know that when creating materials — print, video or web — at Film & Company we do actually follow links to make sure they work as expected. We know you’d want nothing less.

Claes

posted in business, domain name, news, web design

both comments and pings are currently closed.