Design Is Not the Enemy

Been trying to find time to start a blog for a while now. I had this article forwarded to me yesterday, and that provided the final impetus I needed. Go on and give the article a read, I’ll wait.

First, let me say that I am on board with the “content marketing revolution”. And, I agree with the first two points in the article, and somewhat with the third. But then this statement:

“Your business should be trying to demonstrate professionalism through your Website content — design isn’t the way to do it. Think about it, anybody can hire a design firm to make something look fancy.”

This strikes me as a very short-sighted and a bit absurd. Saying design firms make things “look fancy” is like saying Einstein “sat around and thought about stuff.”

But let’s back up a second. What exactly is a “professional looking” site? I’m curious to hear from all of you out there. What do you consider “professional looking”? I’m certain that the submissions will be widely varied and visually diverse. Ask any designer who has tried to get in the head of their clients, there is certainly no consensus as to what “professional looking” is. But, let’s say for the sake of argument that we can identify “professional looking” sites as being uncluttered, utilizing navigation that is easy to follow, and including color-corrected images and appropriate headline/body text hierarchy.

Is that such a bad thing? Just including these simple things has already entered you into that wacky world of design.

You can have engaging content generated by the best writers on the planet. But if the design and layout is convoluted, no one is going to read it. So, you say, why don’t we all just use black Helvetica on a white background, include some headlines and call it a day? Let me answer that question with a few others: What’s your favorite color? Do you buy name brand clothing? Which store would you rather shop at, Kmart or Target? Have you ever bought a bottle of wine because you liked the label? Have you ever left an e-commerce web site because the design of it was amateurish and made you question how much you could trust the retailer?

The truth is, design is important. Content is equally important. You need to utilize both in concert to achieve your marketing goals – in any medium, not just the web. Any design firm worth its salt understands this. Design is not about making pretty pictures, it’s about understanding marketing problems and offering robust and measurable solutions.

Courtesy of AIGA: the professional association for design

Finally, it is not true that design-focused sites are a money pit. One of the big challenges for any designer is to stay up to date on emerging technologies, and there’s a lot to keep up with these days. Wordpress, Joomla, Drupal, Rails – the list is endless. However, good designers can leverage any of these technologies to create a scalable solution; a solution that allows you to update your content at any time without having to pay design fees to do it. Good design works as much behind the scenes as it does in front of the curtain.