Blog Posts: Bad Websites/Good Companies
Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies, Part 10: Not Hiring a Writer to Get Clear, Crisp, Compelling Copy»
There’s a myth in website design that “no one reads the copy.” It’s not entirely true. While most of the people who visit your website will not read most of…
Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies, Part 9: Having a Print Designer Design Your Website»
It’s amazing to me that this still happens with a fair degree of regularity. It would seem obvious that print and the web are two distinct mediums requiring different expertise.…
Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies, Part 8: Creating Barriers to Downloading Free Information»
Giving away stuff on your website is a really smart thing to do. It’s an opportunity to spread your ideas or information about your products and services, sometimes in exchange…
Part 7, Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies: Failure to Install or Monitor Site Analytics»
You would think that a company that puts many thousands of dollars into its website would want to track website results to find out how many unique visitors it gets,…
Part 6, Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies: Too Much Stuff on the Home Page»
You’ve seen those homepages with 3 product lead-ins and 2 giveaways and NEW!!! special pricing and the latest news and a billboard about what the company stands for and the…
Part 5, Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies: Having a “Splash” Page»
Splash pages represent a fundamental misunderstanding of the online medium. Often, they come from a print perspective (“books should have a cover”), or sometimes from a broadcast perspective (“a show…
Part 4, Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies: Leaving the Website to the Webmaster or Web Designer»
Don’t get me wrong: web designers and programmers are critical to the process of creating a website. But they cannot manufacture a viable web presence without the ongoing interest and…
Part 3, Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies: Misunderstanding or Neglecting Information Architecture»
Information Architecture (IA) refers to the organization and presentation of information on your website. Sounds simple enough, but many website owners and designers give it very little (if any) thought.…
Part 2, Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies: Creating a Website that Doesn’t Accurately Represent Your Company»
Maybe you saw another company’s website and decided you wanted one just like it. Same bells, same whistles, same cheesy photo of two disembodied hands sealing the deal on the…
Part 1, Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies: Thinking of the Company Website as an Online Brochure»
Ah, the good old days, when the web was a simpler place: you could just take your company brochure and put it online. Often, the only interactive feature was an…