Most companies worry about getting into the top three positions of Google search results related to their product or service. Most don’t worry about the potential client once they go to Web site, though. Mark likens this to a merchant who cares about “location, location, location” but then doesn’t bother to properly decorate the store or hire well-dressed and courteous sales personnel.

In short, he says the basic keys to a successful Web presence are:

1. Brand matters.
2. Usability matters.
3. Search engine optimization matters.

Brand matters: This means that your Web site must reflect the values and personality of your business. And it should inspire trust.  This has everything to do with the style and looks of your Web site. The design of your logo and Web site (the typography, the colors, the choice of images like photos or illustration, how well the overall design is executed, etc.) are critical in transmitting the quality of the service or product you sell and the prices you are likely to command.

Usability matters: This means that your Web site’s design should be intuitive. Users, clients, and prospects should find it easy to navigate or use. If you and your Web design team have done a good job, your visitors will be using the Web the way you want them to and you will be converting a higher percentage of them to paying clients. This also means that visitors expect to easily find information like your telephone number or support email address.

Search engine optimization matters: This means that your Web site should be readily visible in search results for keywords related to your services, products, and location. But how does that happen? One way is by providing relevant content. Blogging is a good way to create quality, unbiased information that visitors find useful, positions you as an authority in your field, and increases the relevance of your content in search engines. But the design and usability of your Web site also matter for SEO. The better the content, the more attractive the design and the easier the site is to use, the more visitors will like and link to your site. And inbound links are key component of the way search engines like Google rank Web sites.

These are broad rules to keep in mind to be sure. Keep them in mind when redesigning your start or commissioning a Web site design for the first time.

I recently saw an article by the owner of a company that sells Website design and marketing services to accountants that offered some sound advice for small business owners and self-employed professionals.

For instance, the article argues that small business Websites should be friendly:

Rather than trying to dazzle the visitor with slick images and stock photos of beautiful people being beautiful, try offering the prospect familiar comfortable images. A picture of a local park, maybe, or main street on a sunny day, kids playing outside the public library… If the initial impression on your site is one of comfort, safety, and best of all, recognition your retention of new visitors will go up more than 30%.

I have to say that I agree with the basic assertion that the Website should be “friendly” and not try too hard to appear to be something it is not as in the case of using slick stock photos of beautiful people.

On the other hand, I disagree that a picture of kids or a local park will lead a client to remember your site. It might help a prospect view you as a local outfit but I doubt it will raise your profile or increase retention. The main problem is that including homemade photos of familiar local places in a willy-nilly manner can quickly cause your Website or marketing collateral to appear amateurish. Friendly is one thing. Unprofessional is another.

The article also says that as a customer buying Web design, you shouldn’t get “bogged down by aesthetics:”

Now is not the right time to indulge in artistic expression. Graphic design changes can drive your costs right through the roof. Trying to find the perfect shade of blue in a world where every monitor on the planet displays colors differently is not an effective use of your time. There are a lot of much more important things that need doing. The site needs to be nice, yes, but the overall look is really a very small part of the design process. In fact, some very effective and profitable websites are just plain ugly. While it’s important for your site to represent your tastes don’t get stuck on creating the “perfect” look. Even if you succeed it won’t be worth the time and money you just spent. All you will have accomplished is creating a site style that appeals to you. This is one of the most fundamental mistakes in advertising. Advertising should not appeal to the advertiser. What you want is a site style that appeals to your prospects.

I like the idea the article expresses of what I’ll call “universality.” That is, your design should appeal to your market, not just to you or to your designer. That is an important principle that trained designers learn in design school.

I also agree that if you are a small business buying custom graphic design you shouldn’t aim at perfection, at least not initially. Graphic design is a process and as it wears on, the design itself improves. Half the battle is just showing up, something that most people in small business understand. And yes, if you are investing in custom graphic and Web design then asking for multiple iterations of your Website or business card is going to start to cost a small fortune.

I do take umbrage, however, in the way the article downplays the importance of aesthetics and that you (or your design supplier) shouldn’t strive for perfection. Aesthetics are important in transmitting your company’s values. In addition, some designs are beautiful, some are just plain ole ugly. Some are in between. Those that are neither here nor there can usually be improved up until the point where the design in question reaches near perfection—in the way the graphics, images and information interact and in the way they obey gestalt principles of design and aesthetics.

Maybe as a small business you can’t afford to hire this kind of design if you are buying design as a service and paying an hourly rate. On the other, I think if you are buying pre-formatted or template-drive graphic or Web design then I think those templates should each be pretty near perfect in and of themselves.

Maybe perfection is not the right word. “Excellence” may be more appropriate because it allows for the idea of improvement over time, a key value in business. But as St. Thomas notes, I want my artist to be pretty darn good at what he does. Ultimately, if I am a small business I want to buy my business identity and marketing collateral design from a company who really believes in the quality of its designs and doesn’t trivialize its importance in the overall scheme of things.

Sure, other aspects of the process are important but if you are buying Web design, then I think you should buy it from someone with a passion for design and his or her own creations.

Craigslist, the Website as it is now.

Wired magazine ran an article not too long ago in its printed and online editions entitled: “Why Craigslist Is Such a Mess.” The story outlined all of the problems with the visual design—and what Web designers like to call “usability”—of the hugely popular classified ads site. Wired notes that in spite of a design that violates “every principle of usability and common sense” the site remains immensely popular. Why is that?

Part of the answer lies in the fact that Craigslist has no true competitors. It gained a here-to-fore insurmountable first-mover advantage in the late 1990s in offering free classified ads and has never looked back since. Companies that don’t have competitors don’t have to worry about design. They don’t have to bother to improve their product because there are no real alternatives. They sell features, not benefits. It’s a classic monopoly situation.

Now take another example, prior to the iPod there were many makes of MP3 players on the market but they were not very user-friendly. Most players were geared towards people who really liked gadgets instead of the broader swath of the population that liked music but could care less about gadgets. Apple saw an opportunity to design a product that was both easier-to-use and more beautiful. By doing so, it was able to capture an astounding 75 percent of the portable music player market and, at one point, even as much as 92 percent.

The comparison is not entirely apt as the iPod is a classic example of an industrial-era product while Craigslist represents a new media virtual public good of sorts. Certainly the economics of these two industries are very different and that might explain why Craigslist is a Website that has no true competitors and, thus, is not forced to make its product more beautiful and more usable. The undeniable fact is that even though it’s downright ugly, it’s usable enough.

So does this mean that you should fire your web designer and make your site look like its 1999? Of course not.

You are not free

The first reason is that if you are a small business or self-employed professional, unlike Craigslist, you cannot afford to give away your product or service for free. You, we (Stylomate is also a small business) have to compete on the basis of something other than free. Small businesses have to offer tangible and intangible benefits.

As consumers,  we value Craiglist only because it’s free. If the company tried to charge us, we wouldn’t remain loyal and we’d go somewhere else that offered us free classified advertising. Again, Craiglist gives us a feature (free classified advertising) not a benefit. Since free things compete on the basis of this most basic feature of “freeness,” they don’t have to sell benefits. Free things can afford to be ugly or hard-to-use because so long as they do give us something we need, we want them only for their freeness.

Competition in your industry is fierce

The second reason is that if you are a small business or self-employed professional in virtually any sector of the economy then you have an inordinate amount of competition. Your website, business card and other marketing collateral vie for attention in a very crowded marketplace.

All this competition among firms selling very similar products or services means that you have to sell the benefits of our products and services and not simply the features. There are a lot of lawyers in Washington, DC and bankers in NYC. What makes you so special?

Design adds perceived value, communicates benefits

This is where design can play an important role in communicating the main benefits that your firm offers. Design adds value by adding the perception of value and by associating products and services with benefits. The more professional your company’s image is, even if you are a one-person shop, the more likely you are to leave a positive impression on a prospective client. And not just any client, but “A-list” clients, the ones that are likely to spend more on your products and services.

Are you an experienced firm that seeks to communicate this benefit? A minimal, clean business card and website design using blues, greens and black and that looks like it was created by a professional designer sends the message that you are a experienced and reputable professional (and certainly not free). The higher the quality of the design of your business’ identity, the better the impression you will make and the more likely clients will be willing to pay a higher price for your services.

Ultimately, a strong business identity design and an equally well-designed and easy-to-use Website design says that you place a great value upon your own service and makes it more likely that clients will value you. After all, if you don’t give yourself a little love first, who will?