Time Magazine has released its list of 50 Best Websites. In a world where social media is king, finding a positive way to stand out from the crowd is essential.
The sites are diverse in terms of products or services, visual appeal, navigation schema, and intended audiences. Click through the entire sequence: seeing 50 strong sites in a row is a good tutorial on the importance of fit among audience, site aesthetic, level of complexity, and content – and it’ll give you a good feel for your own preferences.
I also learned about some great services from the activity, like GetHuman with phone numbers for thousands of companies and instructions on the button to push when you call to reach a human being, Open Yale Courses to download some very interesting classes taught by some pretty smart people, and Quora to find an insightful discussion stream about a variety of topics (or in response to your question) requiring judgment or interpretation.
For those of us whose sites didn’t make the Time list, the key question is obviously why? What does our website look like? What message does it convey? How well does it speak to target audiences? How easy is it to navigate? How well does it sell our goods and services, as well as support the use of them?
Happy website revising, everyone!