Competitors & Site Analysis

Site Analysis of Zoo Negara
URL:http://www.zoonegara.org.my/
There is pretty decent splash page before one enters the site. A flash of different animals featured in the zoo (sound effects included), along with the logo of Zoo Negara at the bottom right corner.

Despite the spiffy splash page, I think the website itself is a bit disappointing.

I’ll start by talking about the colors used. Grey does NOT match the green at all. In fact, it gives of a weird feeling. Green is refreshing and reminds people of nature – which I think is why they used that color; but grey gives off an old, faded feeling. Both the colors don’t compliment each other at all.

The navigation bar on top isn’t working properly.
I had to click once to activate it, and click again to access another page.
The static links suddenly looked like buttons, and it was just really misleading.
It took me awhile to figure out it wasn’t a one-click link.

The sidebar on the right isn’t very nicely designed. There’s a nice wavy line on top but suddenly, there’s a box below.


The links on the right of the main page, that are introducing the animals, lead to a page that feels like it doesn’t even come with the site. It has white background and the layout has a sudden alignment to the left. There’s not even a back button for users to go back to the site.


The news section opens up into not-very-nicely scanned newspaper articles as well. And in PDF format.

They have a badly done map in their “Visitor Info” section. Though I think the flash “guide” makes up for it.

Despite all the flaws on the inconsistency and color scheme of the site, I think its content is very rich, though not to say very nicely presented.
All the information a visitor to the zoo would want is listed on the website.

Competitors of Zoo Negara

1. Taiping Zoo & Night Safari
http://www.zootaiping.gov.my/

As soon as I thought of zoos in Malaysia, I thought of Taiping Zoo. Like the site says, it is located in a lovely natural setting in Taiping Lake Gardens close to the foot of the Larut Hill. Despite being a zoo in a small city, it’s still interesting.
They have embarked on an expansion program which includes the building of new "Open Concept" animal enclosures. These enclosures take into consideration the natural habitat of the respective animal.

There is a splash page before the user enters, that enables them to choose either English or Bahasa Malaysia. Even at the main page, the user can still choose which language to view the site in, which I think is very convenient.


All the pages are consistent, following one same grid.
Pages with longer content have an additional scrollbar between the top and bottom navigation, which I really like.
Make the content seem neater, instead of having to scroll all the way to the bottom.


I really like the colors they used. Of course, it’s not the best, but it does seem much better than the Zoo Negara one. The green and black bring out a cool nature feeling – I think it suits their night safari theme really well.


2. Aquaria KLCC
URL:http://www.klaquaria.com/index.html

I chose Aquaria KLCC as one of the competitors as, even though it is not a zoo, they also have a turtle conservation program and aim to educate the public on marine life. It is also local, so I thought it would be nice to do a site analysis on it too.


The main page features and advertisement on Endau Rompin, Johor’s National Park.
Navigations are below the banner and after clicking into a section, there are sub-navigations available.


The content is limited to the little space they have, and “next” buttons are available to see the remaining information. (Although I noticed there’s a slight problem with the layout in certain pages – the slices weren’t joined well.)


I really like “The Journey” page. By using that image to categorize the information and give visual implementation.


Overall, I think the site is full with information a visitor would need, which is good.
The layout is alright as well. The icons used are also consistent. The site is not very impressive, but it passes as a decent site that aims to promote Aquaria KLCC to visitors.

3. Singapore Zoo
http://www.zoo.com.sg/

After analyzing so many sites, I still see a lot of white backgrounds.
I wonder if it’s a trademark?

Anyway, when I first saw the Singapore Zoo website, I gave off a really oriental feeling – reminded me of Chinese New Year.

I thought the layout was pretty decent, until I clicked into on of the sub-pages.
The whole site was aligned to the left all of a sudden.


The navigations are simple – the usual rollover, and sub-menus come out.
All the sub-pages have the same grid. With a sidebar on the left, and content on the right.

There’s nothing exceptionally interesting about the site, but like the others I mentioned above – there is sufficient information presented.

4. San Diego Zoo
http://www.sandiegozoo.org/

I wanted to research on a site that belongs to a zoo not in South East Asia, so I analyzed San Diego’s Zoo. Just to understand and see for myself the similarities and differences.


I think the colors used are nice. Not the best, but it really gives a friendly feeling – warm and welcoming to nature.
It has a simple layout with a header and a sidebar.

What I really like about the site is the top navigation bar. The rollover effects are really to my liking. The color scheme is also consistent throughout the site – may it be text, paragraph dividers or background colors.

I think the images are also appropriately used.
They’re in fine quality (no pixilated, blurred images) and they’re inserted at the correct place. They don’t flood the whole page yet they manage to catch my attention.
Not to forget, it is also packed with information.

~{ * }~

There were other competitors of Zoo Negara that could be found in Malaysia, but as they didn’t own a site, I was not able to do the comparison of sites.
Here are the other competitors I mentioned: A' Famosa Animal World Safari, KL Bird Park, and Langkawi’s Underwater World


Conclusion:

After going through this research, I felt Zoo Negara plays a big role in educating the public about animals.
Not only information about animals, but also on how to keep them from extinction, on how to preserve their habitats and how important it is to protect them.
Charity functions and field trips are often held there too.

The site aims to promote the zoo – of course. Aiming to attract more visitors, to either just have a visit, class field trip or to have an event there.

I think they already achieve a little bit of that, by providing so much information on the zoo – the highlights and the animals.

The problem is – no one really visits a zoo’s site.

Hence, my aim is to make the site more attractive, not so that the users would just visit the site – but they would actually want to visit the zoo itself. To experience the four pillars Zoo Negara stands on: education, conservation, research and education.