Google Analytics has put together a series of videos demonstrating what poor Web design can do to an online commerce site—crap we'd never put up with in a brick-and-mortar store. There's unintuitive search and site design that prevents you from finding the item you're looking for—in this case, it's a grocery store that makes it impossible to find an everyday item as simple as milk. There's the obnoxious online checkout, where you're forced to log in, agree to terms and prove you're a real person before you get timed out, forcing you to start all over again. Then there's a misplaced dig at Amazon's highly successful, often copied suggestion of other items you might like. Produced by Google's in-house video agency Across the Pond, all the spots have the absurdity of a Monty Python skit. It seems weird for Google to be dissing online search and e-commerce, but here it serves the greater goal of telling people to learn more about their customers via Analytics. And in this case, it's funny 'cause it's true.
