Stu Macik_Broken Sky Studio Web Design and Development, Denver, Colorado
It may not have been spawned from a Jackal but a heinous predator is prowling the small business community in search of prey. This beast…this marketing nightmare lurking in the shadows of the internet is a creature I call…the “Anti-Site”.
The Anti-Site is a website so ghastly that the business who possesses it (or perhaps who is possessed BY it) would be far better off without any website at all.
I know what you’re thinking… that you never thought you would hear a Web Designer/Developer say something like this…I mean after all, surely having something out on the web HAS to be better than having nothing at all.
Well my friend, you would be wrong because the Anti-Site has the ability to actually sabotage your business in ways that you never imagined. One of the most serious points to understand is that you may never even know what’s happening because the Anti-Site is a silent assassin. It drives customers away without remorse or conscience and perhaps the worst aspect of all is that it may have been spawned by…dare I say…an individual or company referring to themselves as “Web Designers”.
I recently had the pleasure of slaying such a beast for a client who suspected that something with his site was very wrong (negative comments and analytics along with a drop in sales). He was having a hard time believing however that since he had “paid” to have the site built that there could possibly be any chance that it could actually be hurting his business. When I explained to him that what he had actually purchased was an ugly template, sloppy (invalid, non-semantic) code and content cobbled together with no organizational or writing skills, he finally admitted to me that the “developer” he used was of a breed I call the “dollar-menu guy”.
The moral of the story? Like everything else in life, when it comes to websites you get what you pay for. My advice is to do your homework and interview multiple developers. Like any field, those with superior skills will be obvious to you and they’re also likely to be more expensive. Because they can be. Because they’re good. Because they can help grow and market your business…and that’s the bottom line.
-Stu
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