Corporate websites

One of the users we follow on Twitter recently posted this amazing article about company website design.

Some of the highlights:

Social networking is about people engaging with people. Individuals do not want to build relationships with brands and corporations. They want to talk to other people. Too many organizations throw millions into Facebook apps and viral videos when they could spend that money on engaging with people in a transparent and open away.

…designing by committee becomes about compromise. Because committee members have different opinions about the design, they look for ways to find common ground. One person hates the blue color scheme, while another loves it. This leads to designing on the fly, with the committee instructing the designer to “try a different blue” in the hopes of finding middle ground. Unfortunately, this leads only to bland design that neither appeals to nor excites anyone.

It reinforces some of the things we’ve been saying for a while such as companies are wasting time trying to market the company through social networking. It also brings up new, and we think quite valid points, about how it’s possible to have too much content on a website as well as the importance of a separate web devision outside the confines of IT and marketing divisions.