We certainly don’t have the number of users that Drupal does – hundreds of thousands – but we have a fair number and trying to get feedback and then incorporate that feedback is always a challenge. Drupal has solved it in a very forward thinking, web 2.0 manner by opening a twitter channel, utilizing Flickr and by using the notion of groups which in Drupal’s case is a simplified forum.

I like the way Drupal has involved the users and the methods they’ve chosen to do so and to organize the information they’ve gotten back. I’m anxious to see how Drupal changes their application in response to the feedback in order to determine the level of success.

If you are in business in 2006 you almost undoubtedly have a website. In fact, you probably also have at least one blog and you may even be utilizing RSS to generate feeds so your users can get up-to-the-minute information on your company, your products and/or your services.

In most cases your current website – though it may have been professionally designed – grew organically from a couple of simple pages into what it is today – in many cases “this” is a confusing jumble of many disjointed and incongruent pages. While you may have spent some time thinking about its design early on you probably haven’t had a lot of time to do so since then.

That’s where I come in. My specialty is in Web Site Evolution. This is a process of reevaluating why your website exists, who it exists to serve and how well those users – most often your current and prospective customers – are being served. Once you and I have answered these fundamental questions I can Evolve your website into a unique, highly professional, appealing and usable extension of your brand and business.

This sounds pretty simple doesn’t it? In fact, it isn’t rocket science and, all things being equal, you could probably do it yourself. So why do you need me you ask? Reality is that all things aren’t equal and you are most likely caught up in the “can’t see the forest for the trees” scenario. You’ve been living with your existing site for quite a while now and it is difficult for you to diagnose problems and come up with elegant solutions.

Here is a before and after example of some work I just finished for NewsGator Technologies in Denver, Co. I was asked to head up the redesign/evolution of their marketing pages as well as their online application.

BEFOREAFTER

If you click on the images above you’ll see full sized versions. You can also go to http://www.newsgator.com to see the live site – and you can sign up for a free NewsGator account which I strongly recommend!!

The real power of a third person is that it isn’t someone who is looking at your website through the eyes of the person who designed and built it but through the eyes of your users. Which is a nice segue into the principles of Website Evolution.

Whether it’s a marketing site or a full fledged web application when I am designing for the web I am designing sympathetically with the way people actually use the web, not how I think they should or wish they would.

The bottom line is that very often people use web sites very differently than how we design them. For the most part the average Joe or Jill Sixpack skims pages for clues, instead of reading the text in its entirety. Typically users make snap decisions, instead of evaluating and judging carefully and frequently they don’t even be looking at the complete picture. We have to remember users are driven by their goals, not ours and design accordingly.

I believe responsible designers need special skills to succeed in today’s web environment. Responsible designers must:

* Work to achieve the best possible insight into a site users’ goals and create a design that achieves them.
* Develop a clear understanding of the core purpose of a site, design for that and have the mental discipline to stick to that design.
* Help clients understand the concepts ease of use, simplicity and good design and help them make decisions that facilitate these concepts.
* Relentlessly pursue simplicity – if an element adds complexity but not value, it must be changed or removed entirely.
* Look at designs through naïve eyes – users don’t look at websites the way designers do and thinking they do leads to terrible designs.

When I am working on a project I first strive to get a clear picture of your true purpose, understand the key goals of your target users and start to visualize a high-value solution that ensures everybody achieves their goals.

Every web site is built in response to many disparate needs

Fundamentally, the web is an information medium. People publish stuff in response to a need for information. Your site may have information that people want, you may have information that you want or need them to have, or you may want to get information for them. Your site may be a way to pass information between different consumers. Or it could be a combination all of these things at the same time.

It is critical to understand that every web site tries to meet multiple needs. The publisher must have a need which drives them to publish (to earn money, to gather information, to promote a brand). The site’s visitors must have a need (to buy a product or service, to succeed at their work, to be entertained, or to get needed information).

Behind all these needs are goals that drive our desires and behavior. It’s our goals that drive us to use web sites, to buy products and use services.

Pursuit of goals drives user behavior

People visit web sites because they want to achieve something, a certain state, usually having got something or having done something.

It’s your goals that influence whether you, as a web user, click on a particular link or take the time to look around a web page.

No-one goes on shopping sites for the fun of using the site’s interface. We do it to find bargains or to buy specific products. Those finds help us to feel a certain way (smart, fashionable, relaxed, excited). The site is simply a means to an end.

In order to have a truly effective site – no matter its purpose – the end user’s goals MUST be taken into account and a design created to meet those goals. If you meet those goals chances are very good that your – the publisher’s – goals will be met as well.