In the world of the internet, content is king!

If you have old, stale, bad, or irrelevant content (or no content at all), the best design in the world isn’t going to help.  You go back to blogs that have new content.  You go back to websites with something new to see or read.  You may even go to the Drudge Report several times a day (even if it’s a plain white page with three columns), just for the content.

But a bad design can hurt.  I’m not just talking about ugly graphics.  If people can’t find your content because it’s badly organized, that’s bad design.  If people have to hunt down your contact information in a sub-sub-menu, some people will just give up.  That’s bad design.

So the Big Idea here is understanding what you want to communicate – your big idea.  And then designing an intuitive interface around that idea.

Any school can have an online photo gallery or a list of classes.  Any church can have a website with random listings of random ministries that care enough to put up content.  But a well-designed site will have a big idea (like the discipleship process or the vision or the mission).  And the site navigation will help people understand that big idea and take the next step to become part of that big idea.

If content is king, a good design is the throneroom.  It’s all about access to the king.