Zen and The Art Of Web Design

Wait, isn't the title a play on the name of the book published in the 70's about motorbikes maintenance and philosophy? What has that got to do with web design? The answer is everything! Bear with me and I'll explain: The core idea expressed by Robert M Pirsig in Zen and The Art Of Motorcycle Maintenance was 'the metaphysics of quality'. The intuitive recognition of quality in the human experience. Although I read the book and his subsequent novel, Lila, over a decade ago an example he used sticks in my mind that went something like this: When you accidentally put your hand on a hot stove you don't think, your experience is instinctual and lacks quality so you dash your hand back from the stove.

The web experience is not so very different. Its about intuitive quality. Now I'll stop being oesoteric and get to the point: No web site can manipulate all people to a desired single outcome. Trying to manipulate the design and content to push or direct all visitors through an experience that results in an outcome (usually a sale or enquiry) is impossible and unhelpful. In fact by trying to convert all visitors to leads, you will lose the majority of the audience who know they're being prompted and don't like it. People are smart - smart enough to learn the shortcuts through the Ikea store so they don't have to walk past all the displays just to get to the lamps which was what they came in to look at in the first place.

So what is helpful? Quality information is helpful. Allowing visitors access to view, use and manipulate that information in ways that suits them is helpful. A quality web experience is defined by the ease of access to that information. Quality information is not telling people how good you are or what you do. Its not hype or 'marketing' in the traditional sense. It's more subtle. Its sharing knowledge and skills by demonstration. It's involvement and comment on the topics and issues that potential partners are searching for and seeking help with. Its old fashioned personal service: The person who talks for a while about the quality of the tools when you went to buy one, not the sales assistant who just knows one brand is 'the best'. I know who I'd rather buy my next wrench from.

A quality web experience leads to a sense of quality about the providers of that information. That leads to the most ellusive and greatest of all leads or prospects: The personal recommendation or referral. That most valuable resource for business and communication is expressed on the web as hyperlinking. Its not about the route to market but how the market roots for you. The crazy thing is you don't even have to deploy traditional advertising to achieve that. Just publish what you know. Share your expertise in a meaningful way.

To talk in traditional sales and marketing speak for a second, conversion rates from personal recommendations are the highest of any lead source. Within the World Wide Web personal recommendations are expressed as links to your information from other sites and sources seen as credible in the eyes of the reader. Either that or shear weight of numbers like Ebay feedback. That then leads to communication, to sales, to enquiries. All without manipulation, without the Freudian advertising techniques that have driven marketing, sales and communication since some clever souls realised that psycology could be used to drive behavior not just describe it.

So its all about quality. Every organisation has quality information buried in its collective brain mass. Call it expertise, call it experience, or call it erudition. You have it. Its how you communicate that to prospective partners, customers and random visitors that should be the primary focus of your web design. Its how you allow them to use your knowledge in turn. In short, with the right design your web site can be all things to all people.

So to summarise, manipulative marketing and hype as a way of communicating excellence is dead. The day of quality is upon us. New tools and technologies have accellerated the demise of Freudian advertising. When potential clients and the curious majority can cross reference everything you say at the click of a mouse you can either participate and talk with authority about what you know and do, or try and hide in information cul-de-sacs and hope they don't notice.

Choosing to make best use of the new qualatative age in communication means choosing a web designer or team that provides the right services. They should design using semantic mark-up to describe your information logically so that it can be easily found and used by visitors. That means mark-up like XHTML with CSS that is accessible and validates to W3C design standards.

It also means choosing a web designer that understands how to help you publish and flourish in the information storm that is the World Wide Web: Help like using XML technologies and RSS feeds to syndicated your content across the web. Finaly, it means loosening the control over your knowledge to better communicate your excellence in how you use that knowledge on other's behalf. Welcome to the age of quality information and get good karma for your work, without hype.

More articles