MIAMI — boats.com and the National Marine Manufacturers Association (NMMA) announced winners of the third annual North American Marine Industry Web Awards competition Feb. 15 during the 2007 Miami International Boat Show Media Breakfast.

Launched in 2004, the Marine Web Awards program was developed to recognize company Websites that demonstrate a higher standard of excellence in creative design, ease of navigation and the presentation of up-to-date content.

The five winners received a trophy created by Tony Castro, one of the world?s leading yacht designers.

Best Marine Site Overall

The award for Best Marine Site Overall was presented to Mercury Racing (www.mercuryracing.com). Summing up the judges? decision, Tim Brunelle, head of interactive for Carmichael Lynch, commented, "The Mercury Racing site has it all. The design is right on target, nomenclature is clear and they leverage flash and other animation to enhance users? ability to locate information. They certainly took the time to craft their story. The attention to detail was evident in more than just the appearance; the site also featured useful and intriguing content."

Best Dealer/Broker Site

HMY Yacht Sales (www.hmy.com) received the award for Best Dealer/Broker Site. "HMY.com offers the best content and infrastructure for sealing the deal," said Brunelle. "Their technology is very efficient, the use of flash doesn?t impede navigation and the site is well optimized for search engines. If you?re looking to buy or sell a boat, you can?t go wrong with HMY."

Best OEM/Manufacturer Site

Judges gave the award for Best OEM/Manufacturer Site to Meridian Yachts (www.meridian-yachts.com). "This is a very nicely designed site—the architecture, user interface and nomenclature all contribute to intuitive navigability," noted Brunelle. "The site is built with search engine optimization best practices in mind and it offers well-written and well-produced copy and images."

Best Marine Equipment Site

Blue Sea Systems (www.blueseasystems.biz) took home the trophy for Best Marine Equipment Site. "One of my favorites, the Blue Sea Systems site was obviously a great challenge, and the designers and developers did an outstanding job," Brunelle remarked. "Their skill is evident in the organization of information, user-interface engineering, production detail and the efficiency of the code. Equipment sites typically have tons of information—thousands of SKUs, images, captions, etc. It is to Blue Sea Systems? credit that they embraced such an elegant and efficient design. Brilliant!"

Outstanding Contribution to the Online Marine Industry

The panel of judges honored Boating Life
magazine (www.boatinglife.com) for the most Outstanding Contribution to the Online Marine Industry. "Our vote went to BoatingLife.com because of its deep, easily-accessed resources on all-things-boating," said Brunelle. "This site supplies useful, third-party counterpoint to OEM and dealer sites, which in turn benefits the boating industry. It gives consumers a robust environment in which to begin or compare research, seek objective answers and increase their boating knowledge. The navigation is simple, copy is purposeful without going on too long, and images are plentiful—all things the boating industry needs to make better and broader connections with potential and new boat shoppers."

Other individuals judging the 2007 Web Awards included: Rebecca Silliman of Zeno Group; Julie Adams of ARC Worldwide; Enam Noor of Desme; Fernando Regueiro of NMMA; and James Nolan of boats.com.