News

I was chatting to industry colleague the other day, who happened to mention that she had seen one of our new websites. She described it as looking “basic”.

Now, this colleague who works with interactive web applications or things that move on websites was missing a point.

[More:]

The website she was referring to was born out of a great deal of marketing research and is a useful resource website for our client’s customers. The purpose of the website was clearly defined, the profiles of the users clearly identified and the processes that the site users needed to be supported was built into the functionality. Since the site was launched our client is receiving an increase in enquiries.

The comment that the site was “basic” got me thinking. Isn’t Google a basic site, particularly the home page? All it has is a simple menu and big search box. Isn’t Ebay rather basic looking and isn’t Myspace an ugly site, throwing all the functionality at the user on the home page.

The point is all these “basic” sites are simple and phenomenally successful. And why are they successful? I believe it's because they know who their users are and what they want and need and they meet these wants and needs using a very simple and usable interface.

Research shows that people go to a website with a purpose - websites aren’t television, you only have seconds to keep your web customer on your landing page and if they don’t find what they are looking for instantly then they jump off.

Websites have to anticipate what the users want – sometimes thousands of users at once – but at the same time have to be goal specific to each individual user. The only way to achieve this is by good, clear simple layout and navigation. I guess you could call it basic.

Return to Tickblog Home