DESIGN MATTERS
View entire article at www.iwsdesign.net/news.html
Does design really matter from a business perspective? The answer, according to a recent study by the U.K.-based Design Council, is a resounding "yes."In a study published in February, the Design Council took a look at the Financial Times and London Stock Exchange (FTS)E stock market performance of companies that placed an emphasis on design.
It then tracked the performance of these stocks from 1994 to 2003. The results are astounding.After weeding out companies that were delisted during that period, the Design Council discovered 166 "design-lead" companies that outperformed the market by 200 percent during the study's span. Even 2000-2003's bear market, companies that emphasized design (and won design awards) performed better than those that didn't. They lost less value when times were tough and recovered more when things got better. There's more detail available in the study.
What does this have to do with Web development and marketing? Everything.One of the biggest changes over the past decade, after the Internet industry really got going, has been a move toward commoditization. In the early days, when new technologies were developed at an amazing pace, the industry changed daily, and money flew in at historic rates, most of us in this biz were just beginning to figure out what we were doing.
Consumers were new to the industry, too. They used to be excited about the Internet simply because it was the Internet. Remember Web surfing?Today the Internet is a fact of life for nearly everyone. It's ceased being a novelty in its own right. No one sits down to randomly surf anymore (who's got the time?). Instead, people have figured out how the Web fits into their lives and how they need to use it. The shift in behavior is toward the functional: Users go online to get stuff done (even if that "stuff" is entertainment).
The crash changed everything. It popped both economic and emotional bubbles. It made everyone step back and think about what they were really excited about in the first place. Over time, most people (especially consumers) have become blasé about the whole thing. We use the Web because we have to, but using it is no longer an activity in and of itself. It's a coming of age: When you're underage, acquiring booze is the activity, which makes it all a lot more exciting. Turn 21, and drinking ceases to become the exciting activity once was. (At least, that's what people tell me.)So far as Web development goes, things have gone the same way.
In the early days, we had to create all the tools we sold our clients from scratch. There was little off-the-shelf software of note. Everything from content management systems to databases to e-mail marketing systems were homegrown. Differentiation stemmed from the ability to do absolutely everything: design, market, develop, engineer. Investment in companies that could do this ran high.Things are no longer the same.
The industry has matured and fragmented into specialized disciplines. Few Web development firms do everything anymore. Almost no one rolls his own e-mail systems, CMSs, registration tools, or other fixtures of contemporary Web sites. We buy them off the shelf, selecting from a pool of basically similar products (within different price ranges), integrate them, and switch everything on.
Does design really matter from a business perspective? The answer, according to a recent study by the U.K.-based Design Council, is a resounding "yes."In a study published in February, the Design Council took a look at the Financial Times and London Stock Exchange (FTS)E stock market performance of companies that placed an emphasis on design.
It then tracked the performance of these stocks from 1994 to 2003. The results are astounding.After weeding out companies that were delisted during that period, the Design Council discovered 166 "design-lead" companies that outperformed the market by 200 percent during the study's span. Even 2000-2003's bear market, companies that emphasized design (and won design awards) performed better than those that didn't. They lost less value when times were tough and recovered more when things got better. There's more detail available in the study.
What does this have to do with Web development and marketing? Everything.One of the biggest changes over the past decade, after the Internet industry really got going, has been a move toward commoditization. In the early days, when new technologies were developed at an amazing pace, the industry changed daily, and money flew in at historic rates, most of us in this biz were just beginning to figure out what we were doing.
Consumers were new to the industry, too. They used to be excited about the Internet simply because it was the Internet. Remember Web surfing?Today the Internet is a fact of life for nearly everyone. It's ceased being a novelty in its own right. No one sits down to randomly surf anymore (who's got the time?). Instead, people have figured out how the Web fits into their lives and how they need to use it. The shift in behavior is toward the functional: Users go online to get stuff done (even if that "stuff" is entertainment).
The crash changed everything. It popped both economic and emotional bubbles. It made everyone step back and think about what they were really excited about in the first place. Over time, most people (especially consumers) have become blasé about the whole thing. We use the Web because we have to, but using it is no longer an activity in and of itself. It's a coming of age: When you're underage, acquiring booze is the activity, which makes it all a lot more exciting. Turn 21, and drinking ceases to become the exciting activity once was. (At least, that's what people tell me.)So far as Web development goes, things have gone the same way.
In the early days, we had to create all the tools we sold our clients from scratch. There was little off-the-shelf software of note. Everything from content management systems to databases to e-mail marketing systems were homegrown. Differentiation stemmed from the ability to do absolutely everything: design, market, develop, engineer. Investment in companies that could do this ran high.Things are no longer the same.
The industry has matured and fragmented into specialized disciplines. Few Web development firms do everything anymore. Almost no one rolls his own e-mail systems, CMSs, registration tools, or other fixtures of contemporary Web sites. We buy them off the shelf, selecting from a pool of basically similar products (within different price ranges), integrate them, and switch everything on.
