Scrivs / Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 6
It can be the most frustrating thing in the world when you have a wonderful looking site that doesn’t perform as well as the competition.
From an aesthetic perspective I hate Balsamiq’s site. I don’t even want to try out the software because I see the site and it just looks generic to me. I might not be a lone in this, but it seems that I might be part of the minority because they have reported over $2 million in sales over the past 18 months.
Their website isn’t pretty, but it does its job of converting and there is a good chance that your site doesn’t. That is the only difference.
Have you ever asked a friend why they like someone? Be careful if you do because they will try to get very intellectual and come up with a bevy of reasons to justify their infatuation. You don’t want to hear all of that. You want them to get to the point. You want them to point to the big, giant, red box that says “Reason” and tell you what it reads.
As generic as “click here” is, do you understand why it is so successful? Because it is telling a person what to do. Put a giant red button in the middle of the screen that says “click here” and you think people won’t click? They won’t even know what is about to happen, but they will click. It is human nature and sites with poor aesthetics, but wonderful conversion rates know how to manipulate human nature like a mound of clay.
Designers have a knack for over thinking or only seeing with the eye that wants to witness something beautiful. To an owner of a business beauty is in the revenue. They want to see sales. They want to know that when a person comes to their site they are purchasing whatever they are selling. If the site gets recognized in some design galleries then that is a very minor pat on the back for them.
If you are a designer and you fear people using themes to build their own websites then you need to get on board with the idea of designing sites that draw the eye to calls for action and not sites that draw the eye to pretty. This doesn’t mean you should jump on board the ugly train, because you never should. But you creating a beautiful website doesn’t mean you did your job. You are not creating masterpieces to be framed, you are designing sites to help businesses.
You will never go to an Amazon or eBay product page and wonder how to purchase the item. You might have some trouble figuring out other things on the site, but handing over your money is not one of them.
When I come across an ugly site that is doing well then I know the person that created the site is probably the owner as well. When they are designing the site they don’t think in terms of gradients, drop shadows and noise. They are thinking to themselves they want a person to buy their product and how they can make them do that. They don’t think how cool it would be to add a jQuery effect, they want to know how many “Buy Now” buttons they can place on a page before pissing someone off.
You can make fun of the people that create their own horrific websites in Frontpage all you want, but there might be a good chance that their version will convert better than any version you come up with.
Rarely does a designer have the luxury of having an IA or UX guru around to do all the user testing. These people excel in testing design prototypes with users to see how they convert. Most freelancers on the other hand tweak a site till it looks pretty and then wait for their client’s approval. If artists attempt to create beauty and designers are out trying to solve the problem of increasing sales, then unfortunately most designers are in the business of being an artist.
If you design websites for people and part of your job doesn’t include showing the site to users and finding out how well the site converts then how much of your job are you really doing? The majority of designers out there have to be their own information architect and their own user experience guru. If you can become that it will make your job easier for when the client wants to use that ugly green instead of red for the button. At that point you can tell them you tested the color and red converted better. That will get them to finally listen and if it doesn’t, at least you did your job.
finch wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
A while back I designed a site for a retailer and the owner asked me to put their specials splattered all over the place. The loud promos he called “barkers” overwhelmed the site. I was disappointed at first, then realized that the people coming there wanted to get a deal and feel like they just walked into the best sale they’ve ever been too. It wasn’t to be sparse a feel like they were in William-Sonoma looking for a $200 bowl, it was something like Walmart looking for a decent $25 bowl. They have the numbers to back it up, so you can’t always argue that the type of design we appreciate is the best way to go. It depends on the company and customers.
darwyn4 wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
“form and function should be one, joined in a spiritual union,”
darwyn4 wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
despite all the studies that have been done, i think we still have a lot to learn about how people make decissions. and it will never be black and white, because our different personalities
Scrivs wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
@finch: Thing is you could’ve probably improved on the aesthetics if you wanted to, but the fact of the matter was that the client understood his clientele. It would’ve been a challenge to pull in the same numbers as them with an aesthetically pleasing design, but isn’t that what the great designers should be capable of doing?
Tyme wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
The trend away from pretty has been going on for quite some time in all aspects of our lives. Houses and buildings were once built with beautiful decorations all throughout. They aren’t anymore unless custom built. People used to dress up in an attempt to look their best going to dinner/club…now people wear jeans.
Yesterday I had a “remember when” moment. We saw this time and time again. We know, from experience, that no matter how pretty something was the feedback we received was “Well, why did you put the button there? It would be easier to use if it was on the other side of the page”. Often that would cripple the aesthetics of the design so the gut instinct for a designer is to not do it…but that’s wrong…if conversions are a goal for the site.
And conversions are the goal for most sites. For those selling something, it is more purchases. For blogs it is more subscribers/comments. Perhaps the goal is to download something or signup for something. Most sites want the viewer to do something.
Designers can make sites that perform and look good. It takes a firm knowledge of the target audience of the client. This is why I think there will be specializations. What works for a gaming site might not work for a online app site and will be different from what works for an e-commerce site.
amberweinberg wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
Personally I think that all top notch designers need to be well versed in iA/UX, at least, that’s how the design school I went to taught.
The Amazon/eBay sites of the world are terribly plain and boring (craigslist anyone?) but it takes a user less than 5 minutes to figure out how it works, how to use it, and to to hand over wads of cash.
Of course I think we can combine both beautiful design and usability, but the problem is, is that most designers go for beauty over usability. They remove the gradients on an input, so it no longer looks like an input, force the user to go through 5 pages instead of one, etc etc.
I once listen to an awesome talk by Justin Davis of Madera Labs at Podcamp who spoke about a lot of these problems. He’s an awesome UX expert. Go check him out. Nows.
brimmingwith wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
It’s true that designers can overthink and can often be subject to OMG-Amazing-jQuery-Effects!! syndrome (I know I often am. Like, every time I open a code editor), but that doesn’t mean that convertibility is more important than a nice looking site. Nice looking isn’t purely about making it “pretty,” it’s about selling the product to the user just as much as the correct placement of the “Buy now” button. Colors and fun effects might become superfluous, but when they’re used correctly, they keep the user on the site. I have no doubt that had Balsamiq’s designers put a little more thought into the visual hierarchy on their site (among other things), they could have converted even more.
Also, ROFL @ Gaia Online button! Cheeky.
DangerousDaniel wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
It’s not as simple as “ugly = good convertion”. The beauty of the balsamiq site is it’s simplicity, no fuzz and straight to the point so you instantly know what it is about; instead of getting lost in fancy effects and cool images. I think the designer here knew very well what he was doing, Typeface fits well together, the search field just works because of it’s look (there is no “search” label but steill people can tell just by shape and icon), menu items are smaller so they dont steal focus from the more important “Try online now” and “learn more” buttons. Plus, you can try out the whole thing just one click away from the home page.
The mistake most designer is to make it hard for people to purchase, either by hiding the “Buy now” link somewhere below the fold, or between other navigation elements, make it “blend in” with the rest of the page or askimg the people to register/sign up before they can do anything on the site.
A good conversation is not just about “how” you display something on a website, but “what” (and what not) to show people.
benek wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
But there’s no reason why you can’t have all of those things and have a design that looks really great. A pretty site and a site that works well are never mutually exclusive.
thomasdavis wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
I believe the importance of a great design is mainly to keep the bounce rate low. One you have jumped over that hurdle the site only needs to call to action by any means possible.
webbedink wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
Lots of things going on in the post and in the comments here. Like you said, the point is that the client understood his clientele. And through discussion and research, the designer can begin to understand the clientele, too. Website designers should be skilled in user experience design. That said, I’m not always impressed by the “user experience” title. Lots of people have it and it doesn’t mean anything to me until they can articulate it. User experience is a bit more difficult to nail down in a website development project than it is in something much more controlled, like software application development. But I agree, more people should include testing and user acceptance as part of design (including me, who should know better than to neglect this).
As someone said, it’s possible to have a beautiful site that converts well, it’s just that we shouldn’t sacrifice tactics that convert for beauty.
This is a great discussion.
Rojo wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
Tell them exactly what you want to do. Focus on that and then you can start to build out and make it pretty. Too many designers work in the opposite direction by making things pretty then trying to tweak them till they work.
LancasterT wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
It’s pretty simple to make a high converting site.
Do not use long form ads, this is actually very bad (though search engines like them I guess). Full page html based ads on the homepage (long form conversion) is very bad for converting.
Give them pictures, and lots of buy buttons…
Give them information and more buy buttons…
Give them straightforward and FAST checkouts (I shoot for no more than 2 pages)
HCG diet
jenfer wrote this Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
Totally agree. The ugly sites often get right to the point without flashy and super-long loading page times. Don’t make the visitor think, make it easy. Make it like falling through a funnel, and it will work no matter how ungly.
You need to Login or Register to comment. Become a member of this great community because you like to be a rebel and actually learn on a website.
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 120
A PHP Error was encountered
Severity: Warning
Message: strtotime(): It is not safe to rely on the system's timezone settings. You are *required* to use the date.timezone setting or the date_default_timezone_set() function. In case you used any of those methods and you are still getting this warning, you most likely misspelled the timezone identifier. We selected 'America/Los_Angeles' for 'PDT/-7.0/DST' instead
Filename: posts/single.php
Line Number: 52
As pointed out in a tweet is there any better call to action than the one on Gaia Online with its big red button?