This week I learned all about qualifying businesses based on their website’s overall appearance. A Google search on businesses in and around the Wilmington area led me to discover there is much more to that restaurant you frequent or your favorite shopping center than meets the eye.
Most of the time when you visit a website you have a specific purpose, whether it is for a phone number, their hours of operation or an address. You usually don’t go to a website and think, “Oh, this is a well put together site.” However, when you are qualifying a website that is what you are thinking! It is important to have a website that is pleasing to the eyes but also user-friendly. While I was browsing these websites, I took into consideration their layout, links on the page, contact information, and other more technical components. In my opinion, a website that is simply a link to their menu with no phone numbers or address listed on the page is an ineffective one. However, a site for a restaurant that shows pictures of their food, has eye catching colors, directions to their location and links at the top of the page that include their menus, content about them and their phone number are good websites!
I have visited a wide variety of websites. Some of them include vegan restaurants, comic book shops or baby apparel stores. I noticed an overall theme as I was analyzing them, and generally, the better the website the more high-end the establishment is. I also found that chain restaurants had the fun websites! Their sites usually have dancing images, quirky music, vibrant colors and easy to access menus. As I was reviewing the sites, especially the restaurants, I thought of the places I have visited. Again, I saw a common pattern. My favorite restaurants or clothing stores also had excellent food or merchandise as well as an excellent website.
This process made me realize that good businesses must also have good websites. The two definitely go hand in hand. Here’s a tip for someone searching in hopes of finding a delicious dining spot for dinner: an aesthetically pleasing site usually means a successful business!