Signs of an Amateur Website

What to Look for When Evaluating Site Designers

If you surf the Internet often, and have seen a lot of websites, you probably already have an eye for what is professional and what smacks of blatant amateurishness. And, as an artist, you know that the seeming quality of your work can be affected by what it hangs next to. That's why artists in particular need quality websites that enhance the value of their work. Even the most accomplished work can seem shabby when placed on a clearly amateurish website.

Like you, we've seen a lot of websites. Sadly, we've found a few polished and professional-quality artist websites and many, many amateur efforts that degrade the quality of the artist's work. Don't let yours be one of them!

First impressions are paramount with websites. The average visitor will decide within a few seconds if your site is worth perusing before moving on to something else. Make sure that first impression is of a site that is appealing, interesting and professional - and that your art shines.

Top 10 + 1 List of 'Amateur Website' Indicators

Here is our top 10 list of the signs of an amateur website. Use this as a guideline when developing your own site or evaluating the work of a site designer.

10. Gaudy, clashing primary colors and eye-twitching all-black websites. Bright colors can be used to good effect as accents and to move the eye around the page. But, remember, your visitors want to be wowed by your art, not overwhelmed by a blaring color scheme. Choose neutrals plus a couple of accent colors that make your art the main element on the page. Black backgrounds can be used effectively, if done carefully, in areas of the site where your eye doesn't need to focus for more than a few seconds. Put the main content on a light background for ease of reading.

9. Fussy decorative page backgrounds are a clear indicator of an amateur website. Choose background colors and textures that are understated and that don't detract from the art. Just like an overdone picture frame can detract from your painting, fussy page backgrounds can do the same and often look like you're trying too hard.

8. Visual clutter. Sites that are too busy and prevent the eye from settling on your most important information are left behind quickly. People simply don't have the time to sort through a bunch of stuff to find the meat of your presentation. Also, fast-moving flash presentations cause headaches for some people, and take forever to load for the 30% of the U.S. population still on dial-up. Use them sparingly and tastefully.

7. Huge text that hits you in the face, and tiny text that you need your magnifying glass to read, both cause problems for visitors. Also, Times New Roman is often a default font for website editor programs, and unless used with expertise, smacks of an amateur effort.  Arial and Verdana (what you're reading now is Verdana 10 pt/size 2) are two appealing fonts that show well on every monitor.

6. Incomplete websites that get going and just stop, with links that don't work and/or 'under construction' signs, are the mark of an amateur. You might as well just put your 'closed' sign up and call it a day. If you have incomplete sections on your site, remove the corresponding links from the navigation bar and add them back when you have those pages ready for viewing.

5. Broken links, bad navigation and bad navigation bars. Broken links suggest that your site is outdated or even abandoned (if there are a lot of them). Visitors who have to hunt to navigate the site won't - they're gone.

4. Ads for products unrelated to you smack of a free website. 'Free' does not equate to professional in anyone's mind. So, if you're using free services, make sure they do not insert ads on your site in exchange for using their services.

3. Bad spelling and grammar. Check and recheck your text for typos, spelling and grammatical errors. Nothing smacks of 'unprofessional' quite like bad spelling.

2. Fuzzy, distorted, pixilated, dark, or otherwise unclear pictures. Your images need to be sized properly in order to show well on a website, and a good web designer will make your images a priority. After all, your work is visual - the images you display should be as crisp and clear as possible to properly showcase your work.

Remember - you want your art to dominate, not the website itself. The website is only the 'wall' upon which you're hanging your art, so don't let it overpower the art.

1. Having a counter on your site. Unless your traffic counter says you've had hundreds of thousands of visitors, it just shows visitors how little traffic you do get (compared to big dogs like Amazon). Yes, you need good traffic statistics, but choose a hosting company that gives you complete traffic reporting. Don't publish your analytics to your viewers. They don't need to know. A traffic counter is probably the #1 indicator across the board of an amateur site. If you've got one on your site, take it off!

0. There's one more indicator we need to mention, and this one creates a negative impression before people even get to your site. It's having your website URL be something like:

www.members.aol.com/terryartist3/

or

http://homepage.mac.com/terry.artist/

instead of:

www.TerryArtist.com

You want your website's address to be professional and to fit with your branding, as well as not let on that you haven't paid for a professionally built website. If you're using a website builder that does not give you your own hosting account (hence, addresses like the aol and mac ones above) there is an easy fix. Simply register your own domain name and redirect it to the index page of your site. Mask the redirect so the underlying domain never shows in the browser window (your domain registrar should be able to redirect and mask for free, and help you do this via phone). When redirected and masked, site visitors will always see just your professional domain name.

Use this list when evaluating potential site designers. Look at sites they have built and compare them to other professional, polished artist websites. You should be able to tell at a glance if their work measures up and will give you and your work the degree of professionalism you need.

If you're unsure how your existing site fares, we'd be happy to review your site and offer feedback and suggestions. Click here to contact us.