25 March 2008 by Simon Mone
I have read a couple of things online recently pointing out that the rules of good aesthetics for web sites have changed little over the last 10 years and that one of the biggest mistakes web site owners make is to choose to change the look and feel of a site when it doesn't need it. There is a school of thought which suggests that a web site should be redesigned every two years but there are other (perhaps more relevant) views. If your site is not performing to you satisfaction (not enough hits; too high a bounce rate; poor ranking; etc etc) then maybe the problem is in the content and functionality not the design. If your site is doing well then maybe you should build on that success not try to rebuild it.
Look at some of the most successful web sites and see how little they change the way they look. Think Amazon, Yahoo, Google even Microsoft. If you look back at the dim and distant past (just short of 10 years if you include Google) and look at the sites for these and other successful web companies you will see that little has changed. Sure they've incorporated new technologies and taken account of changes in computer technology and bandwidth and so on but aesthetically they are very similar to 10 years ago.
Don't get me wrong, good design is paramount to success but providing what the customer wants and helping them find and use it is the key to longevity.
Anyway, I'm off to sell some more design and implementation services and perpetrate the two year myth.
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