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Who Really Cares The Surprising Truth About Compassionate Conservatism

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Ugliness has never looked better. I have spent the last few days examining a surprising trend in web design that has made ugly websites look absolutely irresistible. No, it's not the bolded, 18 point Times New Roman font shouting at me as I access the page that has me excited, nor is it the harsh colors that have actually managed to make my eyes hurt and distort my vision. In fact, it's not even that logo which is so pixelated from being processed, resized, saved, and edited so many times that it appears to be blurred to protect the identity of the company who owns the website that has me singing the praises of ugly websites. What is it?

Ugly sells.

That's right ? ugly websites are surprisingly effective in making money. As a person who puts business before technology, a profitable website is a website that is an unbelievably attractive website to me.

The Case of Plenty of Fish

I was struck by an example of just how effective ugly websites can be this past week as I was browsing through some web related news. I stumbled across the story of Plenty of Fish (http://www.plentyoffish.com/). This is a very plain looking website that offers a free online dating service much like Match.com (but without the subscription fee). There was nothing specifically impressive about the website that stood out to me, in fact the site was actually rather ugly.

What caused me (and I am sure several other people) to take a second look at the website was its reported earnings. It is reported that this website brings in over $10,000 from Adsense ? in one day. Yes, you did read that correctly. For those of you counting, that is $300,000 per month and nearly one million dollars in just three months.

The example of Plenty of Fish led me to consider how an ugly website could be so successful. As I looked around, I suddenly realized that this was not the only successful ugly website. Ebay is unbelievably ugly; Craigslist has never won an award for innovative design, and IMDB has never even bothered to format their text out of the default Times New Roman. What is it about ugly websites that makes them so successful?

The Ability to Convey Trust

A while back I wrote an article on Controlling Your Visitors Eyes (see resource box below). The main point to this article was that you have less than a second to convey your marketing message to your visitor, and that every aspect, from your font selection, to the colors, navigation, and layout of your website plays a part in conveying your marketing message.

When I wrote this article, I had beautiful, CSS designed websites in mind. The idea that an ugly website could present a positive message never crossed my mind. Yet the fact is, ugly websites do have the ability to present the perfect marketing message. What is that message?

You can trust us. We are a family run business and do not employ a marketing team. Our website is simple, but functional. Most importantly, our goal is to serve our customers, not necessarily learn HTML.

As Internet professionals, we often forget that a large part of our society is actually afraid of the Internet. Although online

shopping is growing, most people still have concerns about online security and the impersonal nature of the web. Most people do not know how to surf efficiently and use only the default tools that are given to them when they take their computer out of the box.

And this is one reason that ugly websites can sell. The lack of professionalism and a polished look leads one to believe that they are dealing with an individual. Websites cannot be trusted, but individuals can be trusted.

Function Over Form

Although the above theory holds true in many examples, I believe there is more to the success of ugly websites than just conveying trust. Many of the websites that I referenced above have one underlying trait that can be attributed to their success: they are extremely easy to use.

Google is probably the best example of how functionality over form can lead to success. When Google initially launched, every other major search engine was in the process of transforming themselves into a portal that would offer users all the information they could possibly want, and probably more than they really would want. Google, on the other hand, made their website ridiculously simple. There is one purpose to Google ? to search the web. Nothing else was there to distract you from this one goal. It certainly did not hurt that Google was able to serve up relevant results, but the simplicity of the system was key to winning over users.

Sites like Drudge Report and Craigslist can also trace much of their success back to their functionality. Drudge Report is a very simple website that is essentially a collection of links to news stories. Most of the time, the Drudge Report does not even link over to content on their own website. Users who wanted an interesting collection of links to various news stories could find them all on one simple page. Craigslist also boasts simplicity. The website is simple to browse, simple to post, and simple to use. Because of its simplicity, it grew.

The general lesson here is simplicity. A beautiful website may draw a user in initially, but a simple website will keep your users coming back. If one of your users gets lost trying to navigate your website, check out of your web store, or find simple contact information, then you unnecessarily are increasing the chances that this user will simply leave.

Ugliness By Application ? Not By Rule

Although ugly websites are often easier to use and can convey a unique sense of trust, ugliness is not a rule that should apply to all websites. In fact, the vast majority of websites can be improved by adding formatting and focusing on good site design principles.

There are two general rules that you must keep in mind when building your website: 1) What type of message will resonate with my visitors, and 2) Is the site easy to use?

Knowing the answer to the first question is knowing what type of visitors you are trying to reach. Are your visitors web-savvy and thus looking for a well-designed website? Are your visitors uncomfortable with the impersonal nature of the web and just looking for a simple website that is easy for them to use? Are your visitors scared of using online payment processing, or do they prefer the convenience of paying online where they do not have to talk to a person?

The second question is a rule that should apply to every website: functionality is more important than the design of your website. This does not mean, however, that a beautiful website cannot be easy to use. What this does mean is that you should never sacrifice the usability of your website for a fancy design effect or a more visually appealing website.

In Conclusion ? It's Not Necessarily Ugliness That Sells

As website owners, it is very easy to get caught up in the design of our websites. We want to present our businesses to visitors in the best way possible, and as we get familiar with web technologies and design techniques, it is easy to focus solely on the design of a website from the standpoint of what looks good rather than the message our website conveys.

What we need to keep in mind, is that websites are meant to be used ? used for reading, used for networking, used for shopping, etc. Websites, like any other marketing tool, convey a message and are an invitation for visitors to trust us. Our design needs

to reflect this.

Take a moment today to look over your website. Is it really easy to use? Have you been more worried about the look of your website than its functionality? Would it be more effective if it were simpler in its design?

Did you find this article useful? For more useful tips and hints, points to ponder and keep in mind, techniques, and insights pertaining to credit card, do please browse for more information at our websites.

Who Really Cares The Surprising Truth About Compassionate Conservatism

There is no doubt that bullying is a huge problem in nearly any setting where children and youth congregate, but you may not be able to stop or moderate the bullying by focusing on that issue alone. Yet, often that is what happens. When youth professionals focus solely or primarily on bullying, it may be a bit like seeing the forest but not the trees. Or, perhaps another analogy-- one that might resonate especially well with mental health workers-- is that a primary focus on bullying is a lot like just focusing on an alcoholic's liquor consumption while neglecting to address any of the factors that caused the excessive drinking in the first place. Here is a completely different way of viewing and addressing bullying, one that you may find far more effective than conventional approaches that focus on the symptom of bullying while often overlooking the factors that cause and sustain it.

MYTH To address bullying, use character education or values clarification approaches.

TRUTH While character education and values clarification approaches can have merit, as a reader of this internet magazine, hopefully you have learned that these methods always fail with about 11-14% of youngsters. Do you remember the information presented in past issues on this topic? If you have been to our workshop, you definitely should know the truth on this topic, because we devote hours to it during class. As any of our workshop past participants should be able to tell you, character ed and values clarification approaches will fail with conduct disordered youth. These youngsters lack a conscience or remorse, so character ed and values clarification methods simply won't work at all since those methods require that the child be able to care and have compassion. Since conduct disorders are the most misbehaved students of all, they are also often the bullies. Now, you know why conventional approaches may have limited success reducing bullying.

MYTH Bullying is the primary cause of school shootings.

TRUTH The media loves simple, black and white explanations, and this very simplistic sound bite is just not a very accurate or thorough explanation. While some school shooters were partially motivated by being bullied, to zero in on just the bullying misses the point-- and misses the point on how to prevent an incident. A more accurate way of viewing these youngsters who shoot, is to note that they tend to be clinically depressed, and that in addition to the bullying that they may endure, they are very sad and extremely frustrated. Better than viewing them as worn down by the bullying, it is far more accurate to view them as worn down by many things. Let me explain why this distinction is so important. This distinction is critical because it doesn't require an act of bullying to set this child off. Like a pressure cooker, this student is building up to blow. Certainly bullying could be the thing that causes the blow up, but it could be any event that lights the fuse. When you train your attention on seriously depressed youth (who may be bullied a lot, irregularly, or not at all) you can more readily and precisely identify the youth who could some day explode.

Further, there may be other populations of youth who are statistically far more likely to cause an extremely violent incident. However, having three types of youngsters at risk of extreme violence is a more complicated concept, and not one that the media will necessarily capture for youth professionals. Ironically, although you won't hear it in the media, the bullied child is probably not the one who is at highest risk of extreme violence. If you want to read the details on who are the three highest risk populations, visit our web site at http://www.youthchg.com/hottopic.html. Access to this article is free, and can make a big difference in your understanding of youth violence.

MYTH When teaching bullying prevention, keep the focus on the bullying.

TRUTH While it is fine to focus directly on the bullying, if you stop there, you may be unhappy with the results. To stick with the analogy used earlier, it is like focusing on the amount of liquor consumed rather than helping the alcoholic to learn about self-medicating. In addition to teaching that bullying is wrong, there needs to be a greater focus on teaching the skills youngsters need to behave differently. Further, you need to modify the skills of not just the bully, but also the victims and peers. Typically, we do not necessarily provide specific skill instruction to all three of those groups. The bully needs training to learn new peer interaction skills, but so do the victims and bystanders. If you focus solely on one or two of those groups, you may not get the results you sought. Remember, teaching skills does not mean re-stating expectations or rules. Teaching skills means that you creatively and effectively show students the exact skills that they need to be different. So, for example, you might teach the bully some new "Opening Lines" to use when initiating peer contact, perhaps aiding the youngster to stop threatening, and instead say something less aggressive.

Here are other key areas that are often not taught as part of bullying prevention programs: personal space and distance, interacting with peers who are different, managing hands and other body parts, and how to avoid peer set-ups. There are many more critical skill areas that often are overlooked and left unaddressed. All unaddressed areas will be an endless source of bullying problems so be sure you cover it all.

MYTH You can't significantly reduce the aggressiveness of youngsters who come out of homes and neighborhoods that are very violent.

TRUTH Just because a child is raised around hitting, screaming and threats, does not condemn that youngster to be that way. Certainly, teaching peaceful behavior is a much more difficult task when a student's dad is threatening and coercing his offspring, but it is not the law that children raised in violence inevitably will be violent. Part of the problem is that youth professionals still use one-size-fits-all methods to work with students. Students are not all the same, and until professionals learn to choose different methods for different types of students, then it may seem that "nothing works" with some out-of-control youngsters. In reality, there are methods that can make a huge difference helping children raised in violence to forgo aggression, but first, youth professionals must start using these more targeted, sophisticated approaches. Often, when "nothing works," you are working with a conduct disordered child, and switching to a different set of tools can make a huge difference. Sadly, only mental health workers are usually taught to take this step, and other youth professionals are often not provided this vital information-- information that can literally change the future for many youngsters.

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Both Pawan & Ruth Wells are contributors for EditorialToday. The above articles have been edited for relevancy and timeliness. All write-ups, reviews, tips and guides published by EditorialToday.com and its partners or affiliates are for informational purposes only. They should not be used for any legal or any other type of advice. We do not endorse any author, contributor, writer or article posted by our team.

Pawan has sinced written about articles on various topics from Home Businesses, Gifts for loved ones and E Books. Pawan writes about Indian Wildlife Tours. You can also experience the wild jungles and forests with India Travel Planner including plan for , w. Pawan's top article generates over 3600 views. to your Favourites.

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