Web Principles

Principles of  Web Design and the Evolution of the Internet
The internet’s boom in the late 1990’s came and went so quickly that most people predicted the web was a short-lived fad with no real lasting value to businesses.  But while investors and news media continued to map the demise of large companies and start-up efforts on the net, many smaller business began to apply these principles to their website design and have success with this new medium.

These website design principles continue to guide the evolution of the internet today.  Following is a overview and exploration of these guiding principles. 

Creating Communities – We Belong:
Of all website design principles, this is the first and arguably the foremost guiding the internet. The internet was envisioned from it’s inception as a means to connect people and their knowledge across the globe. As Tim Berners-Lee, the developer of the “world-wide web” states, “The dream behind the Web is of a common information space in which we communicate by sharing information.”

This initial vision continues to be the primary impulse guiding the internet. Anyone can place information on the internet, and anyone, with a connection to the internet and the help of a Search engine, such as Google, can search for it and find the information they want. Google refers to this as the “uniquely democratic nature of the Web” and is an important principle highly valued by Google as well as other search engines. 

Now what brings us together is not geographical location but the sharing of ideas. No matter where you are in the world, you can now share with and belong to a like-minded group of people. This creates a great sense of community. And community, in modern times, has been sorely missed and is much appreciated when it is found. 

Power to the People:
This website design principle is also referred to more and more as Interactivity.  For the first time in history people have the power, via the internet, to find and choose exactly what information they want, when they want it. This is very empowering. And we like it. We like being able to have choices, to be in the driver’s seat. We are not just handed something and told to lump it or leave it. Instead we can make choices and thus make something uniquely our own, for us. 

As technology has evolved, both in terms of broadband access and software developments, this principle’s importance has come to the forefront, creating an ability for web users to be increasing in the driver’s seat, creating their own media, mash-ups and interacting with other users (and companies) in ever-expanding avenues of expression. This growth in empowerment  is referred to as Web 2.0.  Some people are already speculating about Web 3.0 as the internet continue to speed forward with new developments and allow for even greater levels of empowerment.

Give and You Shall Receive:
The third of the website design principles is rooted in the pure beginnings of the internet. Not only did the internet make knowledge available to anyone across the world but a lot of it was and still is FREE. In fact up until 1992 it was illegal to use the internet to makes gains of any kind. And, once something is free, who wants to pay for it? People expect you to give to them – something – for free. I think this harks back to community again, because it signals to them that you are part of the web community and thus a part of their community. Once you are part of their community they will consider taking you into their lives, giving back to you via purchases or information. 

Collaboration:
While Creating Communities is about the users of the web coming together in diverse niches of shared interest, Collaboration is about the companies and marketers who are using the internet as a channel in the hopes of reaching and engaging those users.

With the emergence of Web 2.0 and the increasing desire, as we discussed in Power to the People, for users to be a part of the message, marketers are having to learn to let users have a say in creating their brand image. Communication has moved from a one-way model to a two-way model. If that wasn’t enough to freak marketers and company’s out, which it continues to do, on top of that, web users increasingly want convenience when it comes to searching and interacting with the web. This means, for example, that when looking for videos on line, users do not want to have to look all over the place to find them. They want a one-stop shop where all their video needs are met. So, whoever creates the all-in-one best video website will gain a lead on the competition in capturing this audience and their subsequent purchasing power. Fox, ABC, NBC, all of them now have to think about collaborating to create this type of site. The race has already begun, showing that some of the networks are starting to understand this principle and its potential value while others continue to drag their feet.

Collaboration is hard for most marketers to grasp because it is so foreign to all their thinking to date. And, they must weigh the costs of losing brand value versus the benefits of collaborating with competing brands. Does their brand value diminish and if so, does the value of the collaboration out-weigh these losses? How can you make your brand stand out and at the same time share space with competing brands?

The underlying principle of Collaboration has its origins in the beginning of the computer age. The PBS TV show, Triumph of the Nerds does a great job of documenting the excitement and collaboration of those early days, when everyone shared their discoveries and pooled together to create breakthroughs that benefited everyone. As Jim Warren, the founder of the West Coast Computer Fair put it, “Everybody won.”

Some brands are refusing to collaborate at all. Apple’s iPhone comes to mind. They have outright slapped the hands of their customers who dared to install third-party software on their phones. This is a company that values its brand and guards its reputation to the extreme. They will move towards collaboration kicking and screaming.

On the other side of the spectrum is Google, which continues to, in my book, be purists, using and championing these early established principles of the internet, including collaboration. One of their latest examples is their initiative to compete with Facebook by creating an open source social network called OpenSource. As Mathew Ingram of ReportOnBusiness.com writes in his article Google Aims to Win by Being Open, “it’s an attempt by the Web giant to create a kind of platform for social networking – one that would allow users of different networks such as Facebook, MySpace or LinkedIn to move their data from one to the other and to use applications or services that could draw from all of them.” and “it’s starting to look as though being open may be a more respectable competitive approach than it has been in the past.”

Collaboration is not just for large companies with large websites. It applies to every company with a presence online. Every website owner needs to consider how they can incorporate this principle into their web design to benefit the user and give me them a competitive edge. It is a question that will only become more important as this principle’s role grows in importance in the ongoing evolution of the internet.

Technology Rules:
This is not purely about the internet but it has such an important impact on its evolution that it is included in this overview. One of the main contributors to the tech bust of 2000 was the poor level of technology that was available in the late 1990s. A lot of the possibilities envisioned for the internet were held back by the speed of the connection. As an example, downloading movies in your home is a great idea, but if you don’t have broadband connection, it can take 24 hours. In 1990s, hardly anyone had the technology to use this service. Technological breakthroughs will continue to play an important role with the evolution of the web. Those that take the time to combine its power with the principles we have discussed above will find the greatest success on the web today.

Integrated Marketing: 
Of the website design principles discussed here, this principle is not purely about the internet. It’s an important general marketing principle that goes across all mediums. But it has become more important with the evolution of the internet. 

Mediums do not cross each other out – they co-exist together, each has its own strength, adding to each other’s worth in a symbiotic manner.

Many boom-time ventures envisioned the internet wiping out older mediums, such as books, magazines and even stores. But, if we review the history of emerging mediums, we find each rarely wipes the previous out. We adjust over time and incorporate them into our lives. They co-exist together, in a new way. If done successfully, each marketing medium can work in an integrated manner with other channels.  This principle is now referred to as cross-channel marketing. 

Of course, for those mediums that have been hardest hit, such as magazines and newspapers, the integration and adjustments are making for a very rough ride. But, I do not believe they will be wiped out. Rather, their transformation will take longer and will require a willingness to experiment and explore to meet the needs of the emerging new consumer.