What does your website say about you?

You don't need me to tell you that first impressions are important, but many people underestimate just how important they are for their online presence (i.e. website(s)). I therefore invite you to take a few seconds to honestly evaluate your own web site and see what it says about you. I tend to evaluate a website in about five seconds (as does the average user) and this is what I look for:

Does it load quickly?
When I find a website that doesn't load quickly, I tend to move on even quicker. If it takes over 10 seconds to load, I will probably never go back to it (people who load their sites with Flash please take note). Why? Because it's frustrating! Websites, by their very nature, should make the information you want accessible as quickly as possible. Pages that take a long time to load may prompt people to seek out sites where they can access the information a lot quicker – and they will almost certainly be able to find them.

What does it look like?
I write about design and my business is connected to design and creativity, so naturally the look of a site is very important to me. In fact, my wife and other people say that I am hyper-sensitive about the look of my own sites. The fact is that a good-looking site will prompt people to stay a little longer – and take more notice – than an ugly one. I like simple, stylish looking sites and I like the information to be presented in a logical, stylish manner. Take care when deciding on colour schemes and fonts for your site and ensure that they match the image your want to project.

Is it easy to navigate?
Sites that are overloaded with links that aren’t clearly labelled, organized or relevant are messy and horrible to use. When I find sites plastered with links I tend to grimace and hit the back button. Keep it simple: make the links clear, organized and hierarchical.

Is it reliable?
This is especially important when looking for a service or buying something. I will automatically red flag a site with lots of errors (I am an editor, after all). For example, only this morning I found a site that offered to "analysis the traffic to your site" and then "in simply terms setup a site to generate traffic", with SEO packages to "suite any budget". They also sold wine and holidays… Erm, no thanks. Would you trust the advice, services or products of somebody who can't even be bothered to tidy up their spelling and grammar?

Does it have what I’m looking for?
Time is precious, so if I can't quickly find what I’m looking for, I will quickly go back to the list of search results. People tend to look at sites in relation to their search engine result (obviously) and if they can't get what they're looking for, they simply move on. Your site might look lovely, but if the information people want isn't available almost instantly, then it's bye-bye. This may be sad, because people could be missing out on some great sites, but it is true.

Is it up-to-date?
The design of the website – and the information featured on it – should reflect where you are now in terms of your business/personal career. If you're going to include 'recent news' on your website, then make sure that it really is recent! If your 'latest project' is something completed two years ago, it doesn't really inspire much confidence in how well your business is doing. Likewise, if you are going to include a blog as part of your site, keep it up-to-date. In terms of the look of the site, keep it looking fresh – don't be afraid to redesign your site if you think it needs a makeover.

So how would I honestly evaluate this site? I think it's pretty clean – a white background, not too much information. It loads quickly and I think it's pretty easy to navigate with the large buttons at the top of the page covering the main aspects of our business and the other links covering things in more detail on the main page. As for reliability of the information and having what people are looking for, well I suppose that depends on expectations. We have a lot of experience doing what we do, but our services/opinions may not suit everybody. As for the design – I like it, for now. I think the colour scheme and layout says that we like things to be straightforward, but creative and a little different at the same time. What do you think?