Why having an award-winning website matters
Or better yet, why should you, as a client, spend extra money if only half the budget does the job?
There are multiple reasons, all of them quite simple. First, let’s get into the process of creating websites. Your job as a brand representative is to get the best possible solution for the least amount of resources. It’s a basic principle of business — maximizing the profits while minimizing the risks.
However, award-winning websites are never the ones that play safe. Their brands take chances in design & development because they must stand out to do something that hasn’t been done so far. And that’s risky business. So why would you get involved in that?
Let’s go back to why you would need a website at all. Some common reasons we usually hear are:
- improve conversions,
- elevate brand awareness,
- raise credibility among customers,
- increase customer base
Improving conversions usually comes from a well optimized website, good structure, carefully placed CTA’s and smooth user experience. Apart from the last, it doesn’t really matter if the design is something unheard of, right? Fair enough.
What about brand awareness? Well, there’s the “reaching a lot of people” kind of awareness and then there’s the “making people remember you” kind. If you’re aiming for the latter, you’re going to need to give something worth remembering. Get people talking.
Next up, credibility. You don’t get a lot of chances when people go to your website — if things aren’t working properly or something’s missing, you can be sure nobody is buying your stuff. It’s a reflection of your quality, especially for high-end brands — if you expect a user to pay thousands for a watch, they expect your webshop to be immaculate. Otherwise, how can they trust you?
Lastly, increasing customer base comes from a combination of both reaching people and making them remember you. To do that, we’ve established you need to stand out both aesthetically and functionally.
So, this means you need to do things differently. To do things differently, you need to take risks. If you take risks, you’re more likely to get awards. Awards are actually a byproduct of your brand being bold enough to be remembered.
Everyone knows that. Not a single brief says “we want something mediocre that’s been seen before.” At the beginning of almost every brief it says “we want something unique.”
But then you get hit with “We like Apple’s landing pages.” Unique, just like these 12 examples we found.
And of course this happens, it’s only natural. At the end of the day, it comes back to the core of the business — minimize the risk, maximize the profit. So the best thing to do is make something that looks pretty good but not quite over the top, right? Let’s hit that sweet spot, the golden middle, the best of both worlds, the perfectly balanced look that’s kinda fresh and trendy yet very familiar and easy to digest.
Sure, it makes a lot of sense to think that. That’s exactly why everyone thinks that. And that’s why 90% of the sites look the same. Sometimes that’s fine, not every project needs the fireworks. Sometimes, the site just needs to get the job done. Some shouldn’t even be redesigned, like craigslist or 4chan, sites that have established themselves so well it would just be counterproductive to change them. But these are exceptions. If you want to go farther and take your brand to the next level, you’ll need to think bigger.
Brand awareness is a tough thing to defend, we know. Performance is beautiful in this regard. You get to make a presentation to the board that says “you gave me this much money and I have made you this much profit.” That’s what matters at the end of the day.
Brand awareness is less tangible, it’s much too abstract. Yes, everyone knows it matters but then they’ll say “look at these diagrams from the SEO team. Look at the stats” — that’s what’s hot. But the simple fact is those won’t last long unless you have a strong brand presence. Just ask adidas. One doesn’t work without the other.
We have a catchphrase that says “stats are just an accurate collection of inaccurate data.” Not every click happens just because it was positioned pixel-perfectly. People buy emotionally so why would you base your entire strategy on just numbers? Your brand is an emotion, a foundation for results. And it drives more than just sales.
Universal Principles of UX, Irene Pereyra
Conversions are just the beginning
Let’s forget about the users for a moment. There are far more reasons to have an award-winning website that we seem to forget.
There’s a great sense of competition among the companies within the same industry. That’s why they’re called the competition. You can rest assured that once you’ve launched a new website or done anything interesting, there’s a watercooler conversation pretty much along the lines of “how come our website doesn’t look like this?” and within a month they will hire someone to do it. If your website wins an award, even more people will get rowdy. You are now the only one that’s achieved this among the competitors. Make a few more moves like that and all those people will stop asking questions and start taking an interest in working for you instead.
And these are usually highly driven workers who thrive on ideas, who are proactive and who want to work with other people like them. Especially senior level experts. They will not come to work for you because of ping-pong tables, flexible hours and free cereal. They have that already. They don’t care about the promises, they care about the results. And you have just shown them results.
Winning awards doesn’t just spark the interests of your competitors. The people who work for you will also get a boost of morale, especially those involved. Getting recognized like that makes people also more likely to share the news and builds the culture of teamwork. Something that every HR manager spends great amounts of time and effort to achieve.
This is simply good PR and good PR is good business. It will put you on the map with potential business leads and probably make you already known at the next networking event. Big brands know this, that’s why they’re big.
What’s in it for you?
So in a nutshell, winning a website award gets you
- More brand exposure, which leads to a wider customer base and conversions
- Brand credibility and prestige, something users are willing to pay for
- Better employer branding that gets you high quality recruits
- A bigger network of potential partnerships
- A jealous competition (worth every penny)
But how do you make sure the agency you picked is right for the job?
This is the best part. A bit of inside track — if the agency you’re working with is awards-driven and you tell them you just want to get the job done, they will get the job done. No problem. But if you tell them “we want an award”, they will go the extra mile and then some. Because all of a sudden, there’s a mutual goal and a shared vision which is the best motivator there is. It’s a personal achievement for the people working on the project as well. A win-win. And that’s what you need to get people extra motivated. This is when ideas get polished a little bit more, when people stay late to get more out of the project, when details are better than ever and when everyone pushes for more.
We want great sites for portfolio just as much as you want results to show to your board. Extra mile in web production means having a fully functional website and then saying “alright, let’s get to work.” That’s how you get outstanding websites. It takes time & money, just like anything in life.
You might ask yourself “can I really afford to stand out?”
Ask yourself if you can afford not to.
