When it comes to websites, the bad ones aren’t always easy to spot. Similarly, bad friends aren’t always easy to identify at first. So, this lesson may help with both your business and your personal life. (Please note, we are not therapists. Do not take our advice on your relationships. We are website experts and all website advice should be taken to heart.) Let’s get started.
Beauty is Only One Click Deep
You know the old adage “beauty is only skin deep,” right? When it comes to friends, we all know the type – beautiful hair, pretty smile, eyes that sparkle. But, when you need advice or want to discuss current events, all you get is a blank stare. Her eyelashes – those beautiful long eyelashes – flutter, but nothing comes out.
Enter, the bad website. You land on the homepage and it looks great. Wow, this company really knows what they’re doing. They’ve got style. They’ve drawn you in. You click to dive deeper into the site…wait…nothing happened. Ok, we’ll broken links occasionally happen, right? Maybe it just happened. You try the about us page and as it loads, you’re immediately let down. You find a brief sentence about the business and some placeholder copy that appears to be Latin, no not Latin, Klingon maybe? This is also known as Greeked text, a frequent practice in design, but all good website developers will make sure all Greeked text is replaced with actual content before launching a site.
By now, the glow of that beautiful homepage has worn off and before you can even find the contact information (buried 3 clicks away), you’re starting to question if this is a place you want to do business with.
Fixing the Problem
This is where our analogy ends. While there’s not much you can do to change your beautiful, but terrible friend, fixing a bad website is well within reach. If you fear that you or one of your clients have an all looks/no substance site, there are ways to fix it and hopefully undo any damage they’ve done.
- Site Audit – A site audit is a must with these types of sites. When we run into a site in this category, we analyze each page checking links, image load times and content. The first step is fixing broken links and immediately removing any placeholder text.
- Re-structure – After we’ve fixed the glaring mistakes, we’ll start looking at the site structure to ensure a great user experience. We’ll look for ways to simplify the process for a customer and make sure that all-important information is easy to find.
- Substance – Finally, we’ll add more substance. Sometimes it’s a blog where the business can keep customers up to date. Sometimes, an FAQ page is needed to answer customer questions. Wherever content is lacking, we’ll create a strategy to provide more value to customers and prospects.
We’ve found that most qualities of bad friendships are also qualities of bad websites. Fortunately for us and our clients, we can control our websites. Friends are another story and we hope that your friends are all as amazing as a Trebletree website – beautiful inside and out.
