I’ve seen both eBay and Amazon launch campaigns to their users that start off with a letter from the CEO on the home page. This is an interesting way to get your message across.

Typically, web sites would simply roll out a new feature and communicate the new feature with custom messaging. In the case of Amazon here, the user would come to the home landing page, and be shown a message regarding “instant video and PS3” and the user would probably ignore the message and move right along. Clearly, a letter from the CEO has the impact of making the message seem important as well as really capture the user’s attention. Obviously, this can’t be done with every feature – then it would become ineffective. So where to draw the line? Maybe just use this treatment once a quarter? Twice a year? Once a year? This is one of those features where the more you use it, the less effective it will become. 🙂