No Website is Better Than a Bad One - by Gerry McGovern

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Not publishing is much better than publishing poor quality
content. Most people come to websites to carry out tasks.
Quality content will help them complete these tasks quickly and
efficiently. Poor quality content hinders task completion, and
frustrates and annoys people.
There is a lot of content on Irish government websites about
renewing your driving license. Some of it is useful, some of it
not very useful. Much of it is well written, but some of it is
badly written. I read content on one website that contradicted
content on another website. The online license renewal form I
tried to use reflected very poor design. Instead of being
convenient it was a major waste of time.
When establishing websites, some organizations make the serious
mistake of thinking that something is better than nothing. Many
managers see a website as a project. They measure success based
on things done. The website has an online application form, it
has a search engine, and it has content. The form and search
engine may not work well, the content may be badly written, but
that's not what's important. What is important is that the
project is completed.
No manager sets out to design a bad website. The problem is that
too many managers view content as a commodity instead of the
critical asset that it is. I've known managers who will spend a
lot of time focusing on graphics, and then give the content
creation job to the most junior person they can find. I've known
others who believe that once they've chosen the right content
management software, their job is done.
The graphics and the technology are a minor part of web success.
The content is the hard part, and it is also what will make your
website a success or failure. What I read as I tried to renew my
license online lead me to waste a lot of time. It would have
been a much better situation if I was presented with the
following:
To renew your driving license, please ring your local county
council office. A contact list follows.
I would have rang, got a form sent out in the post, filled it in
and sent it back. Job done in the minimum amount of time and
hassle. Not everything works better on the Web. Renewing a
driving license requires a signature that will in fact be
appended to the driving license itself. This means that you need
a print form. On this print form it tells you exactly what else
you need (photographs, fee, etc.), so there's no need to publish
this information on a website.
Some organizations complain that they don't have the resources
to professionally manage their websites. That is not an excuse.
No website is better, and much cheaper, than a bad website.
Websites are supposed to save time, and yet my experience is
that they more often than not waste it.
If your website isn't working, then fix it or get rid of it, but
don't just leave it up there and ignore it. Every day, real
people with real tasks come to your website. If your website
wastes their time then you risk damaging the reputation of your
organization. No website is better than a bad website.
Gerry McGovern
<mailto:gerry@gerrymcgovern.com>
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Gerry McGovern is a web content management author and
consultant
http://www.gerrymcgovern.com