Bad Websites
If your website is bad, I assume your business is bad. Your website is in most cases my first impression of your company, product, service, leadership, business processes, etc. Your website is the basis on which I form my thoughts and feelings about your business. This is especially true for software companies. A friend of mine says that in the absence of information is imagination. You do not want to give people a bad basis on which to let their imagination run wild, and it will.
I want to give a few more examples of how my mind works when I interact with a website. I come to your website and it looks really old and outdated. I consequently think that your entire business (product and/or service included) is old and outdated. I come to your website and it looks really complicated and not well organized. As a result, I think the same is true of your business. I come to your website and it looks very abstract and difficult to navigate. I assume it's not even worth the time to explore more. You get the point.
This is 2014. It is completely your choice to have a bad website, if you're in a position to make a decision on the matter. There are multiple platforms to easily build a fairly simple website on your own and plenty of ways to have web designers and developers build your site for you (in most cases the better option). Just search "website builder" or "web design" and you'll start to see your plethora of options.
Let me free you. You don't have to have a bad website! You can take steps today to get a project going to update and maintain your website. Your website can communicate what you want people to understand and feel about your business. Remember, the question isn't "Is my website communicating to people?". The question is "Is my website communicating to people what I want them to understand and feel about my company?". I am begging you to please take action. It genuinely saddens me to think of so many great businesses communicating that their businesses are bad via their website. Social media is an entirely different subject that maybe we could cover in a future post.
Systems Analyst at Watershed Security
10 年Websites that have numerous broken links because they have not kept in sync with the other URLs they reference. Poor quality maintenance on the part of the webmaster.
Freelance Web Designer at Contractor
10 年Agreed! Key elements.. precision, symmetry, balance and aesthetics...! Too wordy & difficult navigation = you've already lost me ; )
Project Manager @ Aventi | Remote Teams & Project Management
10 年Amen!