Website design…conclusion
Posted on August 23, 2005
So, as my recent post stated, the debate was over how long a site should go before being given a facelift. Here’s my definitive conclusion, which is in line with the commenters on the last post.
Content is king and people are going to visit your site for the content, not for the design. A clean and simple design is best. You’ve got to give your visitors a reason to come back, such as anticipation of something new.
Blogs are prime examples of content being king. The only reason to return to a blog is for something new. Which leads us right into RSS.
Most of us use some type of RSS reader, like Bloglines or NewsGator and the data is pushed to us, so we never even see the site. But people (me) still fret about our site’s look and feel. Someone’s going there, especially to comment.
What about a church website? Does design matter? Sure it does. It needs to be designed in a way that is clean and simple and the content needs to express your message. The content also needs to be dynamic, always current. The days of static content are over, no more just throwing the info up there and forgetting about it. Sites like my former church site are a big no-no. We had way to many chiefs in the mix on the ‘committee’. Everybody was an expert and nobody listened to the true experts in the room…….me (?)
So, my conclusion would be content is more important than design. If your content is kept current, design is less of an issue, but changing the look periodically is not a bad thing.
There’s no formula here, no magic wand, just good old fashioned judgement.
Oh yeah, why do we keep going back to Yahoo! and Google? Because they offer us something and we become extremely brand loyal in that regard, I think. I search for basic data exclusively on Google, I use Yahoo! because of My Yahoo! where I have years and years worth of bookmarks and other miscellaneous stuff. They give me something I want and need.
Why do you visit your bank website a few times a week? (doesn’t anyone else do that or just me?) Because they provide something of value. (Does anyone else avoid doing that because it’s depressing at times or is that just me, as well?)
Why do you visit your own church website on a daily or at least a weekly basis? Because there is fresh information there about current events going on around the church……..or is your church site lacking?
Something to think about.
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