Old Spice's Manly Website, Man

Carrying your brand message through several different media is a valuable way of reinforcing the effectiveness of your communications, not to mention ensuring that you hit all your target consumers. The Old Spice commercial I discussed in my last post ran during the Superbowl and on TV. As part of the generation that tend to be more hooked onto the internet I know I would have missed out on the Old Spice ads if they stuck to television only. As someone who would be swayed more by advertising on the internet, I thought it would be useful to give a brief evaluation of the Old Spice website.

Context: The layout is clean and fresh like a hot shower and navigation is simple and intuitive like a bar of soap. A simple benchmark of any website, they pass this test handily.
Content: Well, when I first saw the site Isaiah (now relegated to the right-hand panel) and his deep voice were the first thing to greet a visitor, but now the visitor is greeted by the closeup of an armpit. Funky. Otherwise, it is fairly rich in content with some of their humorous videos, photos, and ring tones and an otherwise hardy, manly theme in going in the background.
Community and Communication: On its own page their blog Man Thoughts posts mostly on sports related items. C'mon Old Spice, there are many other manly things than sports that you can talk about. Conversations in this area run pretty light and there are not really any tools for Old Spice fans to talk to each other. 
Commerce: This is where the money is at--selling product. Ironically, the site seems more supportive of selling Old Spice swag rather than its flagship products. Directing potential buyers to their online retail partners doesn't strike me as fully leveraging their already existing online store.
Connections: The only linkage here that are not sales related is to the NASCAR site. I feel a missed opportunity here. I wasn't expecting links to GQ, but I was expecting the site to be more connected to the rest of the online world. Effective websites shouldn't operate in a vaccum.
Customization: This is a one-size-fits-all type of site. Not much personalization to speak of here.

Overall impression: The brand has style, but it needs to work on its substance.
Final score: Three and a half sailboats out of seven.