Little Box Of Ideas posted a good article this week talking about potential design trends of 2010. I realized that I’d probably see those trends on a million websites in the next year. Web design has become a cookie cutter. Sites are put together in the same generic way, with few variations. Banner, nav bar, two or three columns including one main content one, footer. It’s everywhere, and I’m as guilty as the next man.

When Did You Last Sit Back And Think, “Whoa…”?

I saw a site last week that just blew me away. Take a look at www.workingelement.com because it’s amazing. For sheer visual impact it’s just streets ahead of most of what else is out there. Sure, I could criticize the overuse of Flash, the apparent poor accessibility, or other factors. I’d be indulging in pedantry though, because from a design standpoint it’s just a truly outstanding site.

It’s also a rarity. I see a lot of websites every day. Many of them are well put together, competently designed, visually attractive. They are good examples of the genre. That’s the problem. If they’re good examples of the genre then that suggests they’re generic. If something is generic then it doesn’t truly stand out. I couldn’t remember the names or designs of most of the sites I saw. Competent as they are, they blend together.

Generic Outcomes From An Inward Looking Clique

Social media is great, isn’t it? It lets us network every day with other web designers, pointing each other to good content and highlighting excellent work. We congratulate each other, rarely is a negative word said. And the result is that we’ve become comfortable. Our design inspiration for websites is … other websites. Our design inspiration for logos is … other logos. Our design inspiration for typography is … other typography.

Useful collaboration and pooling of resources is one thing. Incestuous complacency, an unwillingness to take risks, that’s something else. Great design doesn’t always obey the rules. In fact great design should provoke passion – either in loving something or hating it. We’re locked into a traditional approach to web design. A decade old industry which is already stuck in traditional approaches! Websites, even “good” websites, well what they most look like is … another website. Maybe I’ll make an acronym – JAW – to signify that, “just another website”.

Let The Perfect Be The Enemy Of The Merely Good

Don’t be afraid to be radical, to stretch for something new. Don’t be afraid to deliberately step away from the accepted wisdom of web design. The great artists in history didn’t create derivative work, they broke the rules. Take your inspiration from anywhere but the web. Run away from your computer. Take pieces of inspiration from everywhere; architecture, fashion, nature, cars, hairstyles, a puddle, sculpture, photography, music … anything except another website, another logo or another font. Go with your gut – if you think the main navigation menu would be best in the bottom right of the page, then do it, and ignore the accepted wisdom that says this is wrong.

This is not saying ignore your clients, this is not saying totally ignore what’s worked in the past. But don’t be bound by it. Let’s push back against the derivative nature of web design. Always be seeking to push the boundaries of both the technology and your imagination.

There’s a very narrow view of web accessibility, and it’s a view that caters to a tiny percentage of internet users. Rather than taking a holistic approach to the topic, both designers and clients overemphasize a checklist of supposed accessibility features. They should instead be focusing on a wider view of accessibility.

What Percentage Of Visitors Do You Support?

Everyone wants to stop support of Internet Explorer 6. If the number of IE6 users on a website drops below 10%, perhaps that’s time to stop support. Maybe it’s 5%, maybe it’s as low as 1%.

Those who require a screen reader, or closed captioning, or manual assistance to use most websites are probably less than 1% of general visitors. I’d guess they’re *certainly* less than 5%. If those were users of a specific browser we’d be talking about abandoning support. So why do we bend over backwards to support such a tiny proportion of these users?

Sometimes You Need To Support

I’ve worked for public sector clients, and they have a legal requirement to ensure their websites are fully accessible to the visually, physically or hearing impaired. There’s obvious reasons for that, they’re providing a public service that needs to be available to all. In some countries private companies need to ensure their sites are similarly accessible. Of course if you have a legal requirement to ensure this type of accessibility, then you need to fulfil that.

Sometimes You Don’t

I don’t really care that much if my website is accessible to the visually impaired, or the physically disabled. I write clean and valid code, but largely because it’s good practice to do so and, once you get in the habit, easier than hacking. I’m not going to exert specific effort on an audience that’s irrelevant to me.

I don’t feel a moral duty to provide this kind of accessibility for my own site. I provide it insofar as it matches my general design and coding practice, but that’s it. I wouldn’t support users of a specific browser if they made up a tiny percentage of my audience and required special effort. Exactly the same applies to any other group of users.

“Accessibility” Doesn’t Mean Accessibility

There’s a big difference between the narrow definition of accessible and the wider meaning of the word. It’s very possible to make a site that checks all the relevant boxes of web accessibility guidelines, and still be ugly and difficult to use. It’s more than possible, in fact, it’s pretty much the norm for public sector websites around the world. They’re a living demonstration of why checking off items on a list is no substitute for making a site widely accessible and usable.

I want websites to be *usable*. Usable is a more important definition than the narrow list of what makes a site “accessible”. That incorporates clean code and validation of semantic markup, so it covers most of the bases of “accessibility”, but it’s not the main focus. Usability is about making a website design easy for the most people possible. “Accessibility” is all too often about making a site equally unfriendly for all.

…no, wait. We *should* link to work that we think is awesome. Actually we link to work that we think is kinda good. See that big list of “great dark websites” that someone posted yesterday (it doesn’t matter who, someone definitely posted a list of great dark websites yesterday)? I’ll wager at least a dollar that most of those sites didn’t make the author sit back in amazement at the design. More likely they thought “yeah, that’s pretty decent, and I’ve got to pad this list out.”

The Easiest Kind Of Blog Post

Struggling for inspiration? Haven’t posted on your blog in a couple of days? Throw up a list. It’s easy, quick and often thoughtless but, hey, it’s content, right? You can bump it, stumble it, tweet it and because it’s easy to scan it’ll probably get shared around. You might even get some comments along the lines of “Great list, I really liked #3 in particular.” That’s interactive, isn’t it?

It’s not like you need to put any particular thought into it. A paragraph intro, a list of links, and maybe some screenshots. Done and out the door. So no surprise to see list posts being tweeted about on a daily basis. It’s a pity, because it is possible to post a worthwhile list of cool sites and great examples of web design, it’s just that most people don’t bother.

Do You Care About Your List?

If it’s just a bunch of links, I don’t even know what you think about the list. If I’m reading your blog it’s probably because I have some interest in your opinion. I suppose technically your opening “hey, these are cool” paragraph is an opinion, but I’m pretty sure you’re being lazy. I’m even more sure when I realize I’ve seen half your list posted on other blogs over the course of the last two weeks.

I want to know what you think about each item on your list. I’ll be more confident that you genuinely appreciate what you’re posting if you express an opinion about it. Doesn’t have to be much, just a paragraph or two about each item you post. Highlight why you chose that site to showcase, what’s great about it, what’s *original* about it, and maybe even some constructive criticism about what can be improved.

Could You Pretend To Be Original?

I’ve seen lists about dark sites, red sites, portfolio sites, blog sites. Half the time I’m looking at the same stuff, because I saw it on another list. I know that www.someurl.com is a good example of a pastel blue site, I’ve been told fifteen times this year.

Search for something that I haven’t seen before. Choose something that genuinely inspires you, not just a well put together design. A collection of stuff I’ve already seen isn’t particularly inspiring, nor does it suggest that you put much thought into it. When I see a list of great web design I want to see something that I wouldn’t have found otherwise, and something that I believe you really thought was something special.

Give me a short list of websites you loved, not a long list of websites you sorta liked.

Harder Work = Better Lists

It’s pretty simple. Stop looking at lists as the easy option. Yeah, I know that sometimes you just want to get that post out, and I’m not pretending I’ve always been perfect in following all my own advice. But I decided that the easy option just isn’t really worth it. If you don’t have that extra hour’s worth of time to dedicate to a real list post, then frankly, don’t bother posting today. I’m kinda bored of it.

Social media is often misunderstood, in its purpose, importance, worth and nature. I dropped a note to some experts in the field to see what they thought were the most common misconceptions about social media. As a web designer I was also interested to see what my peers thought, so I contacted not just social media “experts”, but also bloggers and designers whose work I respect and who I see using social media effectively.

Chris Brogan

chrisbrogan.com | @chrisbrogan

Chris Brogan is President of New Marketing Labs, working with global companies to help them integrate social media into their marketing activities. He’s an author and speaker, and one of the premier opinion leaders and trendsetters about social media technology. He calls himself a typist.

The most common misconception is that social media is simply a new channel for marketing. Instead, it’s new technology for communications. Marketing is one way to communicate, but it ends up feeling like a bullhorn or someone standing on stage, whereas the experience of social media is more like a telephone, or theater in the round.

Darren Rowse

problogger.net | @problogger

Darren Rowse is a professional blogger. He’s Vice President of Blogger Training at b5media, one of the largest blog networks in the world. He also runs ProBlogger, one of the premier sources of blogging advice and tutorials online. He recently released the e-book ‘31 Days To Build A Better Blog‘.

There are many misconceptions but here’s two (hope that that’s ok).

1. you can’t make money with social media – you can, but you just need to do it in a way that delivers value to those you’re interacting with.

2. social media HAS TO BE a conversation – while it is often at its best as a conversation there are plenty of examples of people who use it successfully as a broadcasting tool.

Paul Boag

boagworld.com | @boagworld

Paul Boag is founder and Creative Director at the award winning Headscape web design agency. He hosts the long running and hugely popular web design podcast and blog Boagworld. He writes for .NET magazine and speaks regularly on web design at events such as SXSW, @media and FOWD.

In my opinion the biggest misconception is that social media is new. Social media is about people interacting online and that has been around since before the world wide web existed. People think social media is about leveraging Facebook or having a Twitter strategy. It is not. Social media is about building community and having real relationship online. It’s about communication. This can be done through tools like Twitter and Facebook. However, it can just as easily be done in a chat room or on a forum. Don’t get caught up in the hype, build long term communities that will outlast the current fashionable tool.

Mark Dykeman

broadcasting-brain.com | @MarkDykeman

Mark Dykeman is a Canadian based IT professional who observes and writes on social media in all forms. As well as his own blog, Broadcasting Brain, he’s contributed to the likes of LouisGray.com and Mashable. He’s the writer of the free ebook ‘Social Destinations Of The Web‘.

The biggest misconception about social media, like many other things, is that phrase from Field of Dreams:  “if you build it, they will come”.  Even though you (as an individual or a company) may build a social media presence, it doesn’t mean that people will flock to you, despite any fame or recognition you may have outside of social media.  You need to actively engage people.

Lee Munroe

leemunroe.com | @leemunroe

Lee Munroe is a Belfast based front end web designer whose work has been featured in publications such as Wired and Web Designer Magazine. He writes a wide ranging blog examining all aspects of the web design process, and his articles seem to have a knack of encouraging great discussions in the comments.

That by taking part all of a sudden makes your company hip and cool

I was really interested in the responses I got. There seemed to be one common theme running through the answers, and one which I agree with. Social media can’t be a one way street. It doesn’t work if it isn’t a conversation, a two way communication (I loved Chris Brogan’s analogy of the theater in the round). Unless you engage with social media, and add value to your networks, you’ll never see a benefit.

A failure to understand that need for two way communication and added value is still very common. It’s the friend you have who thinks Twitter is just people sending boring tweets about what they had for breakfast, it’s the newspaper columnist who’s taken an anecdotal story about YouTube as hard evidence without learning more, it’s the multinational corporation thinking that merely having a Facebook fan page means they’re “doing” social media. As Paul Boag said, social media is about having a real relationship.

For me the biggest misconception is that the tools are the story. It’s like saying that the room where a cocktail reception is held is “networking”. Just as you gain no benefit from merely being in the room at a cocktail reception, whether sitting in the corner or talking without listening, there’s no inherent benefit in Twitter, Facebook, YouTube or any other tool. Social media is activity and communication.

The Basics

Adding your information to Haystack is easy. You sign up, add your web page info and your email, and add a screenshot. The idea is that this screenshot is an item from your portfolio, a demonstration of your best work. I’ve seen that option used a lot, others choose to upload a screenshot of their own website. For a monthly fee you can upload several screenshots to give a wider view of your work.

You browse Haystack by viewing pretty large thumbnails (fee-payers can make this even larger) and pen-pic info in a simple and easy interface. You can target by geographical location, or by price range.

Potential clients can then just click on an icon, view a larger screenshot, and contact the designer through their website or email. It’s a good system for clients, because it’s really easy to use.

The Price Range Problem

When you create an account on Haystack as a designer you’re asked to specify your price range.

• Up to $3,000
• $3,000 – $10,000
• $10,000 – $25,000
• $25,000 – $50,000
• More than $50,000

Every client who uses the site is going to see this listed as your price range. You can only pick one, and that’s a big problem.

In the last year I’ve worked on projects worth a few hundred dollars, and others worth tens of thousands. I don’t think I’m unusual among freelance web designers either, who often work on a wide variety of projects of different scopes.

I’m not interesting in pigeonholing myself, nor do I find it easy to do. I make great websites. I don’t just make great websites in a particular price range.  I don’t want to miss out on business because a client saw my price range listing on Haystack and decided that his project was outside that scope. I think Haystack penalizes the individual freelancer. It’s web design agencies who tend to focus more specifically on a typical scope of project size and cost. They’ll find it easier to convey an accurate price range.

Not All Bad, Though

Haystack is a good website, and despite my concerns I’ve signed up (choosing the $3,000 – $10,000 price range as a happy medium!). It has two things going for it in particular.

It provides people looking for web design services with a user friendly and visually attractive medium to browse potential service providers. That’s something that’s been lacking for a long time. immediate comparison unrestricted by Google searches and PR blurb from companies looking to make a sale.

It also demonstrates the maturity of web design as a service. It acts effectively as a counterpoint to the various freelance boards where web design jobs are astoundingly undervalued in terms of cost and service (as I’ve discussed before in ‘No, Websites Cost More Than Fifty Bucks!’). Here is an index that allows web designers to display their availability while demonstrating confidence that their skills warrant the prices they charge.

Haystack is good and I support it. I just wish it wouldn’t force me to artificially pigeonhole myself in terms of project scope and price range.