During E3, what used to be a massive entertainment software convention, I tend to search for a fair number of games over at Gamespot.  Usually I get it right, only searching for games I know are released.  Sometimes, though, I get it wrong.

Here’s the screen that appears when I search for “rob is cool”, a phrase I’m sure is at the top of Gamespot’s analytics ;)

My eyes shot down to the orange and white text below, which appear to be search results… until I read one.

“Robert Free?  Reduce De-… oh…  eww.”

The very first bit of information on the page is “Search results for…”, only to be followed by “No Results Found”, which because I know there are results, read as “X Results Found” and start scanning.

Percentage wise, let’s look at the amount of space dedicated this key bit of information.  In this tiny cutout featuring 237,500 pixels, a modest 850 (0.3%) are reserved for the word “No”.

Instead of using a Google-like “did you mean…?” to match text with games, you’re effectively searching for  advertising.  Type in “final fintasy” or “super marip brothers” and, although Google handles these quite effectively, a site dedicated to gaming does not.

I know of no better way to devalue your visitor’s time than to show them what amounts to junk mail after they make a typo.