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Is content more important than design when it comes to launching a new website? - 9 January 2012

There is no denying that design plays an important part in any website, after all the look of a page is the first thing a potential customer will see and can instantly give the impression as to whether your company is reputable or not.

However, content is the driving force for many websites, a potential customer will be visiting your site for information and not to stare at your beautifully crafted site design.

Many of the most successful websites have started out (with many still maintaining) a simple design which is built around the content of the site. Take a look at websites such as Google, Yahoo and Wikipedia for instance. Facebook, the second largest website after Google, has faced an onslaught of complaints about its constant design changes, however still remains undeniably popular due to its content.

Search engines don’t care about how your site looks; when practicing search marketing there is a vast amount of ways to improve your site visibility within search engines, all of which are related to content. Title tags, meta tags and keywords are all used to rank your site within a search engine and are all included within the content of a website. For proof you can head over to the Lynx browser to see how your website appears to search engines.

In the past year Google has also rolled out its infamous Panda update; Google’s method of quality control which can make or break your site depending on your content. To keep the Panda happy focus on interesting, engaging and original content and consider featuring it within article marketing sites, blogs and directories.

Expired content can be damaging, something which isn’t an issue with design and therefore it is important to stay on top of upkeep. If a potential customer visits your site to find out of date or inaccurate content, or links which are of date, this will have a damaging effect on your company’s reputation.

A more recent benefit of content is that it can be shared through social networks and bookmarking sites such as Facebook, Twitter, Stumbleupon and Reddit. The rapid increase in social media based sites means that if you create content that people want to share, your content marketing can be done for you by fans, followers and sharers. Post regular and engaging updates, blog posts and articles with links back to your websites, and watch as your social media customers share your links around the internet.

There really is no excuse not to provide top quality content, it can be simple to keep up to date with the use of html and coding, something which most marketing firms will have a sound knowledge of. Design on the other hand often has to be taken to a specialist company with experience within Photoshop at least. If your writing skills could do with some improving, there are lots of creative writing resources online as well as numerous copywriters who are eager for work and can give your site the kick start that it needs.