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Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies, Part 10: Not Hiring a Writer to Get Clear, Crisp, Compelling Copy

Author: Ray Gulick; Published: Sep 29, 2010; Category: Bad Websites/Good Companies, Communication, Design/Development, Information Architecture, Marketing; Tags: Communication, Information Architecture, Marketing, writing for web; No Comments

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 the copy, the few visitors who are really interested in what you have to offer will. If they’re really interested, they’re your best prospects. And even casual visitors scan your content (quickly), looking for a reason to get interested. If they don’t find it, of course, they’re gone.

Unless you have too much business (I don’t know anyone in that position right now), how can you afford to communicate with website visitors with anything less than clear, crisp, and compelling copy?

Building a great website requires several different skill sets

People tend to think of website design as either a technology project (for which they need a programmer or coder) or design project (for which they need a web designer). There is no doubt that both of those characterizations are partially true, and that people with those skill sets are critical to producing a great—or even adequate—website. But no matter how great it looks or how well it works, without clearly communicated and compelling messages, the site will yield disappointing results (you’d like some results, right?).

Many people pride themselves on their ability to write well. But writing for distracted and non-commital website visitors is a skill few people possess. In addition to being clear and compelling, a web writer must be concise. Using too many words to express a thought chases away all of your casual visitors and all but the most determined of your best prospects. A writer who can develop strong messages and write clear, compelling, and concise website copy should be on your speed dial.

You are not the best example of someone in your market

You’re an expert in your field. Few of your website visitors know a tenth of what you know about your products and services. Because of your expertise, you will make assumptions about what’s important to talk about on your site that won’t match up with what your visitors want or need to know. Website content should be organized and written for your visitors, not for you. It might be more elementary than you would write, but it’s important to communicate with your visitors in a way that helps them quickly understand what you offer. If they understand, they’re more likely to take action.

If a website visitor doesn’t take action, you’ve probably lost them

A skilled web writer can organize your content (information architecture) as part of creating a strategy for moving visitors toward action. That action might be registering for an email newsletter, downloading a whitepaper, or placing an order. For non-profit organizations, it might be making a donation or volunteering. Most people do not arrive at your website with the intention of placing an order or taking the next step toward becoming a customer. If they do so, it’s because the information on the site convinced them. If they’re not convinced, the likelihood that they’ll return to check you out again is small.

A good web writer is good at organizing and delivering copy that convinces people to act. As Elvis Presley once sang, “a little less talk and a little more action.”

A caveat: blogging is different than “writing for the web”

Beyond the ability to write clearly, writing blog posts does not require the same skills described above. Blogging is more of a conversation, a chance for people to get a sense of who you are and what you think. If you’re a bit wordy, no problem. If you want to talk about things only experts in your field will fully grasp, go for it. Lots of successful bloggers cannot write copy that leads website visitors to take action other than leaving a comment. That’s OK because that’s not the goal of (most) blog posts. Just don’t assume that, because someone has a blog and writes “on the web”, that they can write “for the web.”

Why Bad Websites Happen to Good Companies, Part 9: Having a Print Designer Design Your Website

Author: Ray Gulick; Published: Sep 9, 2010; Category: Bad Websites/Good Companies, Design/Development, Information Architecture, Usability; Tags: Accessibility, Design/Development; 2 Comments

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. But unfortunately, it’s not uncommon. Design-is-design-is-design to many people, and many of them continue to think of web design as “on-screen graphic design.” I’ve discussed this before. It has nothing to do with whether or not print design or web design is “harder” or “better,” but how they are “different.” Asking a print designer to design a website is much like asking an interior designer to redo your landscaping: different expertise and understanding is required. It’s also not the best idea to ask a web designer to design your annual report.

Before I go further, let me say I have worked (and continue to work) with some print designers who understand there are differences and do their best to approach web design differently and accommodate the needs of website visitors. They generally have accepted the fact that web pages must accommodate many different browsers and system settings, and that their work will not display uniformly to everyone who sees it. They recognize that on the web, information is more important than packaging if it comes down to a choice between the two, and they try to avoid ”designing in“ accessibility or usability issues. They take advice about aspects of their design that are problematic from a usability or information architecture perspective. I like working with those designers and in fact, they often push me to do things outside my “comfort zone,” which often leads to me learning something new.

What’s more important: design or information?

Many print designers see the web as a hostile environment for their visual “designs,” which they hold as the most important aspect of web design. It bothers these folks mightily that they cannot absolutely control how their design is rendered in visitors’ browsers. They have little or no understanding of how (or why) to provide for these differences, and often as not, cause usability or accessibility problems trying to control the “user experience,” by which they mean “visual experience.” There are still print designers (in 2010!) who set paragraph or headline text in photoshop and display text as images on their website (how else to make sure that everyone sees your carefully kerned 11.5 point Museo Sans on 18 point leading?).

But while visual design is important (I’m a designer too, and I believe in the power of design to influence thinking and behavior), it’s pointless if the ability for visitors to find, access, or utilize the information is compromised. The fundamental idea of the web is the ability to search and find relevant information. Design that interferes with that is not only a waste of time, but destructive to the purpose of your website. Good web designers understand that and learn techniques and design approaches that preserve and even enhance usability and accessibility.

Should an interior designer design your landscaping?

Even if you really like and trust your interior designer and you love what they can do to a room with color and fabric, do you really think he or she has an understanding of plants, soil, drainage, etc., that will result in a satisfactory landscape? They may love a nice landscape, and relish the challenge of working in a new medium, but the most likely reality is that there are big gaps in their landscape design expertise that you will have to live with in the finished landscape.

As with the example above, rarely do websites designed by print designers live up to expectations of usability, interactivity, search engine-friendliness, or information architecture, regardless of how nice they might look. The understanding of the web and expertise to leverage its ability to communicate, inform, and persuade is simply not present. Good web designers offer these things along with beautiful and functional design.

The above image represents my primary point that, while there is some overlap in knowledge and skills between print and web design, there are large amounts of knowledge and skill required for each discipline that are not common. There are, no doubt, some designers who have mastered both areas, but they are unusual and rare. While I started my design career in print, after focusing on web design for at least a decade, it’s difficult for me to change my perspective back to that required for really good print design; my design mindset no longer supports that perspective. I know from working with print designers that they have similar problems adjusting to a web perspective.

Bottom line: find a good web designer and put them in charge of your website design or redesign. And if your favorite designer is a print designer and you really want him/her to design your website, insist that they find a good web front-end developer to team with. You’ll get better results in how the site serves your visitors, which means your website goals are much more likely to be realized.

Quick Tutorial: Simple PHP and CSS to Highlight Current Navigation Section

Author: Ray Gulick; Published: Jul 12, 2009; Category: CSS, Design/Development, Information Architecture, PHP for Designers; Tags: Design/Development, Information Architecture; 9 Comments

Good website navigation not only helps visitors find the information they are looking for, it also tells them where they are on a website. This is especially important in light of the fact that people may arrive anywhere on a website via search or a link from another website. They will appreciate some indication of what section of the website they are in; sort of a “you are here” marker.

Essentially, we want to tell the navigation list that, if the navigation section is ‘X’, then this particular navigation list item should have a "current" class applied to it, which would allow us to style that item to highlight the navigation section. But the last thing we need, if we’re busy and have better things to do, is to edit the navigation on each page individually: every time we add or remove a page or change a navigation item name, we would have to update the navigation on every page.

We can make our lives easier with PHP. Remember, PHP executes on the server: you must upload your files to a PHP-enabled server to see it work. It will not execute on your desktop unless you have a local server set up. But if so, you are way beyond this little tutorial…

Below is the HTML for a very simple list-based navigation, and below that, the accompanying CSS. See the demo here»

The demo navigation should look like this:

The HTML

<ul class="navigation">
<li><a href="index.php">Home</a></li>
<li><a href="what.php">What We Do</a></li>
<li><a href="who.php">Who We Are</a></li>
<li><a href="why.php">Why We Do It</a></li>
<li><a href="need.php">Why You Need It</a></li>
<li><a href="contact.php">Contact Us</a></li>
</ul>

The CSS

ul.navigation { margin:0px; padding:0px; list-style-type:none; }
ul.navigation li { display:inline; margin:0; padding:0; }
ul.navigation a { float:left; display:inline; font-size:14px;
     font-weight:bold; text-decoration:none; white-space:nowrap;
     padding:2px 10px 2px 10px; background:#fc0;
     border-left:1px solid #fff; }
ul.navigation a:link, ul.navigation a:visited { color:#000; }
ul.navigation li a:hover { color:#fff; }

Create a PHP include from the navigation list and place a call for it on each page.

This include is placed on each page in place of the navigation list with the following call for the include:

<?php include("includes/navigation.php"); ?>

This calls for the include, which was named “navigation.php”, and placed in a folder called “includes”.

Add PHP code to the list items in the include file to display the “current” class when called for:

<ul class="navigation">
<li<?php echo ($navsection == 'home') ? ' class="current"' : ''; ?>>
  <a href="index.php">Home</a></li>
<li<?php echo ($navsection == 'what') ? ' class="current"' : ''; ?>>
  <a href="what.php">What We Do</a></li>
<li<?php echo ($navsection == 'who') ? ' class="current"' : ''; ?>>
  <a href="who.php">Who We Are</a></li>
<li<?php echo ($navsection == 'why') ? ' class="current"' : ''; ?>>
  <a href="why.php">Why We Do It</a></li>
<li<?php echo ($navsection == 'need') ? ' class="current"' : ''; ?>>
  <a href="need.php">Why You Need It</a></li>
<li<?php echo ($navsection == 'contact') ? ' class="current"' : ''; ?>>
  <a href="contact.php">Contact Us</a></li>
</ul>

Add styles to highlight the navigation items when list item has "current" class applied.

ul.navigation li.current a:link, ul.navigation li.current a:visited
     { color:#fff; background:#000; }
ul.navigation li.current a:hover
     { color:#fff; background:#c00; }

One last thing: put the appropriate navigation section info on each page.

At the very top of the HTML page, prior to the doc statement, add the following 3 lines of code:

<?php
    $navsection = 'home';
?>

Note that this particular example would be found above the doc statement on the home page. Because it matches the navsection statement attached to the home page list item on the menu, that list item displays with the “current” class.

This technique works well on the top level of list-based drop-down menus as well, though I have found that it’s easier to attach the "current" class to the link rather than to the list item. CSS, of course, must be adjusted accordingly.

Design Team Roles for Best Results

Author: Ray Gulick; Published: May 22, 2009; Category: Business, Design/Development, Information Architecture, Marketing; Tags: Communication, Design/Development; 2 Comments

DOH! We recently had a glitch on a logo/web design project for which I take complete responsibility. Knowing the client was anxious to get the website completed, I tried to shortcut the logo design phase. Oh sure, we gathered all the information, took careful notes about the company, its competitors, its products, and its markets and market challenges. But we skipped the part where we crystallize those notes into a Design Specification document, and get agreement that the design spec represents an accurate assessment of the client’s needs. And we skipped talking about the roles we all play in the design process.

As a result, we soon had a client who was directing us to make the font bigger, and make it skinny, and…you get the idea. Fortunately, I work with a writer who has a talent for telling everyone how things are going to be, and we all got squared away and went back to work in our proper roles, working from a design spec she pulled together in record time. And we’re all still friends. Totally dodged a bullet.

So what are the roles that make for a productive design team? In this case, there were 3 roles: the client, the copywriter, and the designer.

The client

The client’s role is pretty straightforward, really. They need to tell us what we need to know about their business and markets. When we come back with a design spec, they need to tell us where we got it right and where and how we got it wrong, and help clear up any misunderstanding or miscommunication revealed in the spec. Before we can design a logo that represents their company, we all need to feel comfortable that we understand what the logo should communicate. The design spec serves as a "communication blueprint," identifying critical messages and priorities. When we return with logo options, the client uses the design spec as a basis for evaluating them. That nearly always elevates the conversation above the "can you make the font bigger" discussions. If it doesn’t avoid them altogether, it at least gives you something to pull the discussion back to.

The copywriter

Copywriters are not always included on a design team, but whenever possible, I like to work with a copywriter from the beginning of a design project. We can coordinate written and visual messages better, and it gives me someone to bounce design ideas off. I’ve learned to welcome criticism from writers at this stage, because it often saves me from going down a design path that doesn’t stick to the design spec. As "word people," writers can discuss concepts and represent their perspectives in ways that can give a designer new insight. And when it comes to client presentations, knowing you’ve been held to agreed upon messages is invaluable. If you’re fortunate, you will also (like me) get to work with a writer who can fix any mistakes you make in working with clients.

The designer

The designer’s role is to take all the words—questions and answers, explanations, conceptualizations, confusion, clarifications, technical info, artsy-fartsy hyperbole and half-baked ideas—and spin them into visual gold. Something from which people in a client’s market can derive some useful information about the company; something that gives them the assurance that this is a company they should get to know more about. I wish I could explain how that happens.

Business Blogging, Part 2: Your Content Has Issues

Author: Ray Gulick; Published: May 12, 2009; Category: Blogging, Communication, Information Architecture, Marketing; Tags: Blogging; No Comments

If you’re like a lot of bloggers, you may have started blogging before you’d thought beyond a couple of posts. If it’s a choice between starting before you know what you’re doing or never getting started because you haven’t figured everything out, I’d encourage the former. But for a blog to benefit your business, it needs to focus on what your customers want to know or would find interesting. Google rewards more focused content. If you’ve got lots of posts about solar panel installation and maintenance, for instance, your blog will appear higher in search results for those items than if you have only a few posts about them.

One sign of lack of focus is a frequently changing tagline, trying to find a line that pulls together disparate, unfocused posts. Or, if you have enough self-awareness to know that your posts are going to be all over the place, you might plan ahead and make the tagline something like, "Global Warming and Other Stuff I Find Interesting." If so, you have plenty of company: lots of us have been there.

The thing to keep in mind is this: business blogs are not about personal exploration. You’re trying to provide content that your customers will find when they search for your products and services. And once they find it, you want them to decide there’s enough value in what you have to say that they want to subscribe and come back to read more.

So, how do you find the focus for your business blog? Before you begin blogging, sit down (with someone else who knows your customers, if possible) and make the following lists, as they relate to your products or services.

1. common problems your customers face
2. common areas of confusion for your customers
3. interesting developments in your industry that customers will care about
4. areas where your business provides the greatest value

The things that appear on those lists are what you should be blogging about, almost exclusively. After you’ve made the lists, try to determine what search keywords and phrases might be associated with each list item, and make sure you use those words in your posts. Review the lists and modify them as necessary over time. Things change, and you want to keep up. But more importantly, reviewing them (at least weekly) helps you stay focused and helps you develop new ideas for posts that will speak to your market. And if 95% of your posts are on track, an occasional offbeat post isn’t going to be a problem.

You might think this kind of discipline sounds like "no fun," and that your creativity will be stifled. But in fact, this approach does not preclude fun or creativity. It simply channels your creativity into something your customers will want to read: something "on topic."