The primary focus of this redesign was the pre-login portion that is geared towards prospective customers.

"Our education platform has gone through an evolutionary shift in which we now package our events, webinars and text-based content to a more structured curricula-based offering," said David Fisher, Chief Executive Officer, optionsXpress Holdings, Inc.

Visitors to the site can view a series of video and written content based on their product interests and/or their trading experience level. Much of this educational content was previously available only to customers.

"In addition, we have created a 'test-drive' which allows prospects to use all of our tools and features for 10 days before opening an account," added Fisher. Visitors who sign up for a Test-Drive before October 6, 2008 will be entered to win a new 2008 Cadillac CTS.1

The current redesign also included some enhancements to the post-login portion of the site. In addition to improving the overall speed of the site, the new design is easier and more intuitive for customers to navigate, which has become increasingly important as the amount of content continues to grow.

"We also have introduced the concept of 'hubs,'" stated Fisher. "The purpose of a hub is to bring together categorized content into one easy to use, yet powerful landing page. A great example of this is optionsXpress' new Toolbox hub where it is now easier for users to find trading tools based on a specific product focus or skill level."

Enhancing and redesigning the optionsXpress site is a continuous and iterative process. So far in 2008, optionsXpress has implemented four major site releases that include more than 1,000 enhancements to the platform.