Yesterday we launched an entirely new website. It’s been in the works for months. We’re super excited to launch not only a new website, but the concept of Email Marketing 2.0. But, our excitement for the website launch was a little bit softened when a few faithful followers on Twitter commented that our website looked similar to Firehost’s website.
Anyone who has followed us for long knows that we create a ton of original marketing material. We have no intentions of plagiarizing anyone, especially Firehost. We actually have a great relationship with Chris Drake, CEO of Firehost. He’s been to our office multiple times and we value our friendship with him.
When researching designs for our new website, our design team did look at Firehost, as well as dozens of other great designs. After noting cool design elements from many different sites, our designers went to work creating their own website design. They have been literally “heads down” for weeks working on our site design. Until our Twitter followers pointed it out, we hadn’t realized how similar our site had ended up being to Firehost. We definitely don’t want people to have the impression that we’re plagiarizing — that’s absolutely not what we’re about.
Here are a few recent examples of how our website has evolved just in the past, keeping our branding consistent between them:
Clate and I have already communicated with Chris Drake and apologized. He was gracious enough to understand (our site is hosted with Firehost – he could have easily taken our site down if he had wanted). We look forward to continuing a great relationship with Firehost.
I bring this up to point out the fact that it’s easy to inadvertently create marketing materials that are similar to what other people have created. It’s important to have the integrity to never copy and to make the necessary changes when things don’t feel right.
Thanks to our followers and friends that pointed out the similarities. We’re focused and dedicated to providing email marketing software to help small business grow.
Nice job with the speed you reacted, sorted things out with Firehost & updated the site. Still looks great.
For what it's worth, while the positioning of some of the elements was similar, it was also similar to dozens (if not hundreds) of other websites. It also looks very similar to your previous design.
If you were direct competitors, or you copied the creative behind the main image, or even copied images or HTML/CSS directly then for sure there would be an issue. But everyone takes inspiration from other sites… there was simply nothing revolutionary or unique about their design (in my opinion anyway).
Still, you handled the situation well. It's good to see businesses taking accountability for their actions.
It's great to see you guys be open and honest about the situation. That being said, it would have been great to see you guys push this site beyond this type of design. It is simply way too similar when compared to so many other sites.
lose weight fast…
[...] Find out how to lose your weight in a healthier way [...]…