I’ve always enjoyed the 7 deadly sins as thematic material for art and literature.  So I got a big kick out of the following use of the 7 sins to structure a narrative on bad web design.   Its origin is a webinair by Seth Rosenblatt at the American Marketing Association.  It came to me via a newsletter by Lynn Ericson from Ericson Mitchell.  I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

1. PRIDE (VANITY) — excessive love of self — is pretty easy to recognize if the site is obviously ALL ABOUT YOU. Your company is wonderful, you are wonderful and your product or service is, of course, wonderful — all of which may be true — but if this is your focus, most likely you’re not as concerned as you should be about gearing your site to your clients’ or customers’ needs.  ”What are the benefits to the customer?” has been the marketers’ mantra for as long as I can remember. Not only do you need to connect with your visitors but you must anticipate how they are going to navigate your site.

At Ericson Mitchell, we stress that creating a personality for your company is the essence of your brand. But the personality is not YOU so lose the CEO or president’s photo on the first page of your site — unless he or she is Oprah, Cesar the Dog Whisperer or someone else well enough known to be an integral part of the company’s brand.

2. GREED — an excessive desire for more than one needs — is all about asking for too much from your visitors. Let’s say the consumer is ready to buy your book, for example, and he is about to hit the red BUY NOW button and he notices a few more options:
CLICK HERE to download our latest white paper,
CLICK HERE to sign up for our newsletter,
CLICK HERE to read our privacy policy.

You have provided enough DISTRACTIONS to get him to another page and he’s off on another tangent. The more alternatives you provide to take action, the less likely you are to get the sale. The same is true for asking for too much information on forms — streamlining them makes it much more likely that visitors will actually finish providing the info you need before they’re interrupted by something — and gone.

3. GLUTTONY – wanting more of everything, over-indulgence — is frequently manifested in so many sites, the ones we all run across and exit as quickly as possible. You only have a few seconds to engage a visitor and if your site has TOO MUCH of everything– too many images, too much content and too many typefaces — the result will feel chaotic to the viewer, who will not know where to start reading and probably move on. In the world of web design, we call these “clown pants” sites. The “white space” that designers love so much is not to make sites look pretty but because it helps guide the viewers through your site the way you want them to experience it. Often, less really is more.

4. ENVY — desire for what another has — can result in sending out a generic message on your website. Don’t copy what your competitors are doing. Be clear how you are differentiated from them and emphasize that. Their websites may not be all that effective and when it comes to usability, visitors are more likely to compare your site with the experience of sites they visit frequently and are comfortable with.

6. SLOTH Ask yourself some questions. When was the last time you updated the content in your site? Does your site look stuck in the 1990′s? Are you taking advantage of Google Analytics or even just the statistics provided by your hosting company? The really great thing about the web is that the metrics are so easy to access and you can find out where your visitors come from, what pages they visit, how long they stay, when they visit, etc. Much of this information is FREE. And Content Management Systems are now so much more sophisticated and easy to use that excuses are harder to find for not staying current.

And finally 7. WRATH.  Probably expressing anger on your site is not an issue, unless you want to attract other angry people. Provoking anger is a different story. Visitors who become frustrated navigating your site or annoyed by not finding what they need will give up and go elsewhere. A recent survey by Hostways came up with seven biggest pet peeves:

• Pop up ads
• Being required to install software to view the site
• Dead links
• Confusing navigation
• Required registration to access content
• Slow loading pages
• Ineffective site search tools

70% of respondents said they would be unlikely to purchase from a site that annoyed them, that they would probably never go back and — that they never want to hear from that company again. An irritated visitor is usually an ex-visitor.

Another argument emerges for simple web design (see my previous post  Creating Your Web-Scape)  in Drake Bennett’s article on cognitive fluency, Easy=True. Cognitive fluency is  the psychological precept that “people prefer things that are easy to think about to those that are hard…In any situation where we weigh information, fluency is implicated in our decisions about everything.”

In a nutshell, when information is easier to mentally process, people feel attraction and belief.  The opposite,  disfluency – making things difficult to grasp,  creates a cognitive roadblock that makes people wary and uncomfortable.

While this might seem intuitively obvious, evidence abounds that plenty of businesses (and web designers) don’t get it.

Bennett’s article is a terrific resource for more information on fluency and disfluency and the supporting research.

For the purpose of this blog let’s take a look at the practical implications of fluency and  disfluency in terms of web design.  Keep in mind this is all based on research, not my own preferences.

Disfluency:the art of making things difficult -

Web Design that Loses Business

Here are some characteristics of a disfluent web site that will leave web site visitors with a negative impression.

Inaccessibility

• Unfamiliar words (for example, technical jargon and acronyms)
• Names and words that are difficult to pronounce
• Complex syntax
• Illegible text (see my previous post The Dog and the Lotus)
• Missing information or convoluted instructions
• Functions that don’t quite work

Sensory Overload

• Overcrowding the page
• Visual distractions
• Multiple columns of disparate text
• Little or no white space
• Flickering animation

Inconsistency

• Confusing navigation
• Poor organization

Fluency:the art of making things easy to understand -
Web Design that Encourages Business

Here are some characteristics of a fluent web site that subliminally suggest to visitors that your business is reputable and trustworthy.

Repetition

• Consistent navigation and page layout across the web site
• Artful repetition of key ideas(note: repetition is good, redundancy is bad – know the difference)

Clarity

• Legible fonts and color coordination
• Plenty of white space
• Language and syntax that everyone can understand

Simplicity

• Message boiled down to its essence
• Graphic design and content that are easy to assimilate (accessible) both visually and conceptually

Web Site Analysis: The Glass House

Let’s take a look at the web site for The Glass House and see how well it does fluency wise.

Repetition: The grey box is repeated throughout as the background to the title (I like the opacity that reminds us of the see through quality of glass), the background in the drop down menus, and the background for other important pieces of information.

Clarity: The site contains a lot of information,  notice how it’s been logically organized and categorized.

Simplicity: One column layout, plenty of white space.

Verdict: Fluency.  I’m convinced this is a reputable organization dedicated to professionalism on all levels.

Analysis by Smart Alice Web Design, smart web design for businesses who want a unique and effective presence on the internet.

One of my favorite photographers Bruce Percy says the following about creating a landscape photograph:

“The strength of an image lies many times in what we exclude from it.  Putting more things into a scene can often dilute the strength of the message. Keeping it simple is key.”

Web designers would do well to follow this advice.  Similar to creating a landscape, creating a web site should isolate and focus on what’s important by carefully selecting and streamlining graphic components.  We create something ugly and unfriendly when we clutter a page with multiple ideas, extraneous information, or unnecessary functionality.  Choose one idea and execute it well.  Don’t add stuff just because you can.

Redundancy

For an example of what I’m talking about, let’s visit the Harvard Parks & Recreation web site.  The left column provides links to the rest of the site.  When I mouse over the Main Page tab, the same content links appear (see screen shot on the left).  Why do I need to see the same links twice?

Ugly Graphics – and lots of them

There are three different graphics on the home page.

Landscape photo – used as background for title. Note the gray, out of focus, pixelated photo.  If you can’t find a great photo locally (hard to believe), why not spend $3 for a decent image from iStockPhoto?  The landscape theme is relevant, though.  The message it conveys is “lake/recreation/swimming/boating/fishing.”

Tree logo in the left corner. Suggests a conservation theme.  Relevant?  Not really.

Lawn – close up photo used as background. The obvious message to me is lawn care. Also worth noting are the unnecessary functions that create more visual clutter.  The text next to the check box is barely legible.  Just because it’s easy to count and display visitor numbers, doesn’t mean it should be included.

Three different graphics with three different meanings create visual and mental confusion.  Extraneous functions and poor design contribute to usability issues.

A Simple But Effective Layout

An example of a simple yet effective web site is that of screenwriter Zen Freese.  The coffee stain graphic, the horizontal lines, and the tape are things that remind us of the writing process. We write at our desk, cup of coffee on top of the last draft, taping the latest revision to a page in progress.  Our tools, represented by the two fonts, are a typewriter and a pen.  The message is clear.  Nothing extraneous distracts us from the message.

Web design is about common sense way before it is about how much functionality or other junk you can stuff onto a page.  Keeping it simple for both impact and usability is key.

Commentary by Smart Alice Web Design, smart web design for businesses who want a unique and effective presence on the internet.

“The web design of this web site is horrible.” My daughter was rather annoyed. She had looked up the web site of a local bookstore because she wanted to call them about a book. All she needed was the phone number. Her irritation increased the more she had to click around to find such an obvious piece of information.

How many businesses get caught up with slick, flashy web design but forget to take care of basic information? How many times have you had to click Contact Us to get to a phone number? I’ve visited sites where the phone number or location are seriously buried.

If you want people to call you or locate your place of business, put that information in a prominent location on every page, and never beneath the fold. Consider other factors that contribute to visibility: contrast, font size and color, reverse type, and so forth.

Check out these business sites and see how long it takes you to find the phone number.

Analysis by Smart Alice Web Design, smart web design for businesses who want a unique and effective presence on the internet.

Copyright 2009, Alice Gebura, All Rights Reserved.