Super-smart Todd Malicoat asks the pointed question, “You Wear a Suit to Work, but Let Your Nephew Design Your Website?”

He follows up with, “If you can spend several hundred dollars on a nice suit, you understand why it’s important to make an impression. Why is that so difficult to translate to the web?”

If your storefront or office had garbage everywhere you’d clean it up, right? If your window was busted you’d fix it. This just further illustrates the perceived difference between the online and offline business worlds. Smart business owners understand that their online presence is every bit as important as their offline. It is not a separate entity but part of a greater whole.

I don’t know how many times I’ve heard people say that they used to have a web site that didn’t do anything. Well, why not?

Further digging usually shows a few common characteristics of these doomed sites:

1. Failure to launch. Incomplete information and “under construction” pages make the site unfinished and never really ready for prime-time. There was no “official launch” because of this so there was no promotion to get the thing started.
2. No promotion. “If you build it they will come” only happens in the movies. In the real world you have to let people know something exists before they can check it out.
3. Quitter’s choice. These site owners started and got frustrated that things weren’t happening fast enough or they got too busy or [insert a whole list of excuses] and quit.
4. Culture confusion. Most small business web sites are built for a company that isn’t the one they are supposed to represent. Even if you aren’t aware of it your business has a brand. It may be “eclectic” but it exists in the minds of your customers. When your brick & mortar customers become your online viewers do they embrace the site as a natural extension of your business or are the unsure if they got the right site?
5. Ego-centric. The site is an homage to the greatness of the company or executive staff. A huge error for new businesses online is building the site for themselves instead of the customer.
6. No value. Many “brochure sites” fit in this category. Why would someone tell a friend about this site?
7. Stale abandonment. The site is out of date and out of touch. Some stuff may not work anymore causing errors. This is akin to having a busted window but the breeze you feel is the viewers rushing out.
8. Bad design. Anyone with a laptop and book about HTML thinks they are a web designer! Does the site take too long to load? Have too many toys/gimmicks that distract? Or even look bad/cheap/amateurish? Does the code break causing problems?
9. Broke budget. Running out of money before the site is launched often creates cutbacks that tarnish the energy of the whole project. Or not having enough money to make adjustments after the site is launched. Or enough to promote the site…
10. Spread too thin. Trying to do too much with too little can lead to problems. It is better to do a few things really well than a bunch of stuff poorly.
11. Which way now? The calls to action are weak or nonexistent, checkout processes are confusing, nonstandard navigation leaves the viewer confused. On the other hand, too many choices lead to confusion often creating inaction.
12. Built for everyone. Your web site should qualify visitors into two categories right away: your customers and not your customers. Sites built for everyone appeal to no one.
13. Glad that’s over. Thinking the site is launched and won’t need tracking, adjustments or follow-up. Every site is a work in progress no matter how complete it is for the moment.

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