图文阅读:关于企业网站的十个残酷事实
日期:2009-03-05 11:21

(单词翻译:单击)

导语

转载自:译言网http://www.yeeyan.com/articles/view/35022/31914?orgin=index

作者:TammyTan

10 Harsh Truths About Corporate Websites

We all make mistakes running our websites. However, the nature of those mistakes varies depending on the size of your company. As your organization grows, the mistakes change. This post addresses common mistakes among large organizations.

Most of the clients I work with are large organizations: universities, large charities, public sector institutions and large companies. Over the last 7 years, I have noticed certain recurring misconceptions among these organizations. This post aims to dispel these illusions and encourage people to face the harsh reality.

The problem is that if you are reading this post, you are probably already aware of these things. But hopefully this article will be helpful to you as you convince others within your organization. In any case, here are our 10 harsh truths about websites of large organizations.

关于企业网站的十个残酷事实

运营网站时,我们总会犯些错,那些错误的性质因公司大小而异。然而错误,随着组织的成长而变化。这篇文章提出的是大组织里常见的错误。

我服务的大多数客户都是大组织:大学、大慈善机构、公共机构和大公司。在过去的7年中我注意到,错误的看法在这些大机构里翻来覆去地出现。这篇文章旨在驱散这些幻觉,鼓励人们去面对残酷的现实。

你可能已经意识到这些问题了。希望这篇文章在你想要说服组织里其他人的时候,能帮到你。不管怎样,以下是关于大组织网站的10项残酷事实。

A Separate Web Division

1. You Need A Separate Web Division

In many organizations, the website is managed by either the marketing or IT department. However, this inevitably leads to a turf war, with the website becoming the victim of internal politics.

In reality, pursuing a Web strategy is not particularly suited to either group. IT may be excellent at rolling out complex systems, but it is not suited to developing a friendly user experience or establishing an online brand.

Zeldman urges organisations to create a separate web division.

Marketing, on the other hand, is little better. As Jeffrey Zeldman puts it in his article Let there be Web divisions:

The Web is a conversation. Marketing, by contrast, is a monologue… And then there’s all that messy business with semantic markup, CSS, unobtrusive scripting, card-sorting exercises, HTML run-throughs, involving users in accessibility, and the rest of the skills and experience that don’t fall under Marketing’s purview.

Instead, the website should be managed by a single unified team. Again, Zeldman sums it up when he writes:

Put them in a division that recognizes that your website is not a bastard of your brochures, nor a natural outgrowth of your group calendar. Let there be Web divisions.

1. 你需要一个独立的网络部门

在很多组织里,网站要么由市场部门管理,要么由IT部门管理。这就不可避免地导致争地盘的争斗,而网站就成了内部斗争的牺牲品。

事实上,遵照网络策略,属于哪个部门都不恰当:IT部门可能精通于运营复杂的系统,但它不适合开展友好的用户体验,乃至营造一个在线品牌。

另一方面,市场部门也好不到哪里去。正如Jeffrey Zeldman在他的文章中说到的,建个网络部门:网络是一种交谈。相比之下,市场是一种独白……然后还有林林总总的事项:关于语义标记、CSS、不显眼 的脚本、标签类目、HTML运行得来、让用户处于无障碍环境,以及其他的技能和经验——这不属于市场营销的职权范围。

网站应该由一个独立且统一的团队来管理。Zeldman再次总结了这点:把他们放到一个既不会把你的网站当做私生子,也不会让它放任自流的部门——那就建一个网络部门吧!

Management

2. Managing Your Website Is A Full-Time Job

Not only is the website often split between marketing and IT, it is also usually under-resourced. Instead of there being a dedicated Web team, those responsible for the website are often expected to run it alongside their “day job.” When a Web team is in place, it is often over-stretched. The vast majority of its time is spent on day-to-day maintenance rather than longer-term strategic thinking.

This situation is further aggravated by the fact that the people hired to “maintain” the website are junior members of the staff. They do not have the experience or authority to push the website forward. It is time for organizations to seriously invest in their websites by hiring full-time senior Web managers to move their Web strategies forward.

2. 管理网站是一项全职的工作

网站不仅总是分为市场营销和信息技术,它通常也资源不足。若没有一个专门的网络团队,负责网站营运的责任往往变成“日常工作”之外的事情。对于一个网络团队而言,通常是不堪负荷的。其绝大部分的时间都花在日常维护,而不是长期的战略思考。

这种状况进一步加剧了这一事实,即人们雇用“维护/保持”网站的初级工作人员——他们没有经验和权威来推动网站向前发展。对于组织机构而言,现在,是时候认真地通过聘用专职高级网络管理人员投资在网站上,促成网络战略的前瞻性了。

Redesign

3. Periodic Redesign Is Not Enough

Because corporate websites are under-resourced, they are often neglected for long periods of time. They slowly become out of date with their content, design and technology.

Eventually, the website becomes such an embarrassment that management steps in and demands that it be sorted. This inevitably leads to a complete redesign at considerable expense. As I point out in the Website Owners Manual, this a flawed approach. It is a waste of money because when the old website is replaced, the investment put into it is lost, too. It is also tough on finances, with a large expenditure having to be made every few years.

Cameron Moll encourages web designers to realign their website rather than redesign.

A better way is continual investment in your website, allowing it to evolve over time. Not only is this less wasteful, it is also better for users, as pointed out by Cameron Moll in his post Good Designers Redesign, Great Designers Realign.

3. 定期重新设计是不够的

因为企业网站的资源不足,他们往往会被忽视很长一段时间,慢慢成为过时的内容、设计和技术。

最终,网站处于这样一种尴尬状态:管理层介入,并要求对它进行改版。这就不可避免地导致完全重新设计,花费相当的费用。正如我《网站所有者手册》中 指出的,这是一个有缺陷的方法!这是浪费金钱!因为当旧的网站被取代,投资投入就都丢失了。这也是糟糕的财政状况,因为每隔几年就有比大量的支出。

卡梅伦莫尔鼓励网站设计重新调整他们的网站,而不是重新设计 。

一个更好的方法是持续地投资网站,使之能够随着时间而推移。这不仅是减少浪费,这也是更好地为用户服务,就如梅伦莫尔在他的《Good Designers Redesign》中所说,大设计师会调整。

Appeal to everyone?

4. Your Website Cannot Appeal To Everyone

One of the first questions I ask a client is, “Who is your target audience?” I am regularly shocked at the length of the reply. Too often, it includes a long and detailed list of diverse people. Inevitably, my next question is, “Which of those many demographic groups are most important?” Depressingly, the answer is usually that they are all equally important.

The harsh truth is that if you build a website for everyone, it will appeal to no one. It is important to be extremely focused about your audience and cater your design and content to it. Does this mean you should ignore your other users? Not at all. Your website should be accessible by all and not offend or exclude anybody. However, the website does need to be primarily aimed at a clearly defined audience.

4. 您的网站不可能满足所有人的诉求

我问客户的第一个问题是:“谁是您的目标受众”。我经常震惊于答复的长度。它总是一份长长的详细清单,包括形形色色的人。

不可避免的是,我的下一个问题:“哪些人口群体是最重要的”。令人沮丧的答案是“他们都同样重要”。

严酷的事实却是:如果你为所有人建立一个网站,你就一个人都诉求不到。

重点放在你的客户上,并用你的设计和内容去迎合这个重点,是非常重要的。这意味着你会忽略掉其他用户?没关系。您的网站应便于所有人查阅,不冒犯或排除任何人。然而,它实在需要首先瞄准一个明确界定的受众。

Waste Money

5. You Are Wasting Money On Social Networking

I find it encouraging that website managers increasingly recognize that a Web strategy is more than running a website. They are beginning to use tools such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube to increase their reach and engage with new audiences. However, although they are using these tools, too often they do so ineffectively. Tweeting on a corporate account or posting sales demonstrations on YouTube misses the essence of social networking.


Microsoft dramatically improved its image amoung the development community by allowing Microsoft staff to speak out via the Channel 9 website.

Social networking is about people engaging with people. Individuals do not want to build relationships with brands and corporations. They want to talk to other people. Too many organizations throw millions into Facebook apps and viral videos when they could spend that money on engaging with people in a transparent and open away.

Instead of creating a corporate Twitter account or indeed even a corporate blog, encourage your employees to start Tweeting and blogging themselves. Provide guidelines on acceptable behavior and what tools they need to start engaging directly with the community connected to your products and services. This demonstrates not only your commitment to the community but also the human side of your business.

5. 你在社交网络上浪费金钱

令人鼓舞的是,我发现网站管理人员越来越多地认识到:网络策略不仅仅是运行一个网站。他们开始使用工具,如Twitter、Facebook和 YouTube,以增加与新受众的接触和互动。然而,尽管他们使用了这些工具,但通常却是无效的。用公司账户啁啾小话,或在YouTube上演绎售卖示 范,就有违社会网络的本质了。

社交网络是关于人与人的互动的。个体的人不想建立与品牌或公司的关系。他们希望跟其他人交谈。太多组织在应该花钱与人们透明公开交流的时候,一掷千金到Facebook的应用服务和病毒式影片。

鼓励你的员工自己Tweeting和blog吧,而不是建立企业Twitter的帐户,或者甚至公司博客。提供可以接受的行为准则和工具——他们需要直接参与到与你的产品和服务有关的交流中去。这不但表明了你对社区的承诺,而且表现了你公司的人性化。

Not All About You

6. Your Website Is Not All About You

Where some website managers want their website to appeal to everybody, others want it to appeal to themselves and their colleagues. A surprising number of organizations ignore their users entirely and base their websites entirely on an organizational perspective. This typically manifests itself in inappropriate design that caters to the managing director’s personal preferences and contains content full of jargon.

A website should not pander to the preferences of staff but should rather meet the needs of its users. Too many designs are rejected because the boss “doesn’t like green.” Likewise, too much website copy contains acronyms and terms used only within the organization.

6. 你的网站不是关于你的全部

一些网站管理人员希望他们的网站符合每一个人的诉求,也有些是希望能满足自己和同事的需求。居然有如此众多的组织完全无视他们的用户,并且把网站完全建立在组织的观点里。他们用总经理的个人喜好和满篇的术语来表现自己设计的不恰当。

网站不应迎合工作人员的喜好,而应满足其用户。太多的设计被腰斩的原因是因为老板“不喜欢绿色”。同样的,太多的网站内容包含仅用于本组织内的缩写和术语。

Value from Team

7. You’re Not Getting Value From Your Web Team

Whether they have an in-house Web team or use an external agency, many organizations fail to get the most from their Web designers. Web designers are much more than pixel pushers. They have a wealth of knowledge about the Web and how users interact with it. They also understand design techniques, including grid systems, white space, color theory and much more.

Treating designers as pixel pushers wastes their design experience: post from Twitter complaining about being a pixel pusher

It is therefore wasteful to micro-manage by asking them to “make the logo bigger” or to “move that 3 pixels to the left.” By doing so, you are reducing their role to that of a software operator and wasting the wealth of experience they bring.

If you want to get the maximum return on your Web team, present it with problems, not solutions. For example, if you’re targeting your website at teenage girls, and the designer goes for corporate blue, suggest that your audience might not respond well to that color. Do not tell him or her to change it to pink. This way, the designer has the freedom to find a solution that may even be better than your choice. You allow your designer to solve the problem you have presented.

7. 你没有从网络团队那里获得价值

不管是内部网络团队还是外部代理机构,许多组织没有充分利用他们的网页设计师。网页设计师不仅仅是像素抄写员。他们有丰富的知识,在网络和用户互动方面。他们也明白设计技术,包括网格系统、白色空间、色彩理论等等。

将设计师视为像素抄写员大大浪费了他们的设计经验:来自Twitter的关于像素抄写员的抱怨(原文有截图)

因此要求他们“把logo放大”或“左移3像素”是一种浪费。你这样做,是把他们当做软件操作员,是在减少他们的作用,也是在浪费他们所带来的经验价值。

如果你想在网络团队那里获得最大的回报率,那么请呈递问题而不是解决办法。例如,如果你要把网站目标用户定在十几岁的女孩,设计师试了下公司的标准蓝色,建议说你的受众可能对那个颜色的反应不会很好。不要告诉他或她将它更改为粉红色!

这样的话,设计师可以自由寻找解决方案,甚至可能您的选择更好。让你的设计师解决你提出的问题。

Design by Committee

8. Design By Committee Brings Death

The ultimate symbol of a large organization’s approach to website management is the committee. A committee is often formed to tackle the website because internal politics demand that everybody has a say and all considerations be taken into account. To say that all committees are a bad idea is naive, and to suggest that a large corporate website could be developed without consultation is fanciful. However, when it comes to design, committees are often the kiss of death.

Design by committee leads to design on the fly.

Design is subjective. The way we respond to a design can be influenced by culture, gender, age, childhood experience and even physical conditions (such as color blindness). What one person considers great design could be hated by another. This is why it is so important that design decisions be informed by user testing rather than personal experience. Unfortunately, this approach is rarely taken when a committee is involved in design decisions.

Instead, designing by committee becomes about compromise. Because committee members have different opinions about the design, they look for ways to find common ground. One person hates the blue color scheme, while another loves it. This leads to designing on the fly, with the committee instructing the designer to “try a different blue” in the hopes of finding middle ground. Unfortunately, this leads only to bland design that neither appeals to nor excites anyone.

8. 委员会设计导致毁灭

一个大型组织对待管理的最终办法是管理委员会。委员会方式往往用来对付网站,因为内部政治的需求——每个人都拥有发言权、所有因素都需要加以考虑。

关于所有委员会都很糟糕的说法是天真的;关于大型企业网站在没有协商的基础上就可以发展的建议也是幻想。然而,当涉及到设计的时候,委员会往往是死亡之吻。

设计是主观的。我们对设计的反应会被文化、性别、年龄、经验,甚至儿童时的物质条件(如色盲)影响。一个人认为伟大的设计可能是另一个人讨厌的。这就是为什么设计决策于用户测试而非个人经验的重要原因。

不幸的是,当一个委员会参与设计决定的时候,这种做法很少被考虑。

委员会的设计会变成各方妥协。

由于委员会的成员有不同的设计意见,他们设法找到共同点。一个人讨厌蓝色的轮廓,而另一个喜欢它。这就导致设计上的停滞不前,因为委员会指示设计师“尝试不同的蓝色” ,希望能找到中间立场。不幸的是,这只能导致乏味的设计,既没有满足诉求,也没有让任何人兴奋。

CMS not A Silver Bullet

9. A CMS Is Not A Silver Bullet

Many of the clients I work with have amazingly unrealistic expectations of CMS (content management systems). Those without one think it will solve all of their content woes, while those who have one moan about it because it hasn’t!

It is certainly true that a CMS can bring a lot of benefits. These include:

reducing the technical barriers of adding content,
allowing more people to add and edit content,
facilitating faster updates,
and allowing greater control.
However, many CMS are less flexible than their owners would like. They fail to meet the changing demands of the websites they manage. Website managers also complain that their CMS is hard to use. However, in many cases, this is because those using it have not been adequately trained or are not using it regularly enough.

Finally, a CMS may allow content to be easily updated, but it does not ensure that content will be updated or even that the quality of content will be acceptable. Many CMS-based websites still have out-of-date content or poorly written copy. This is because internal processes have not been put in place to support the content contributors.

If you look to a CMS to solve your website maintenance issues, you will be disappointed.

9. CMS不是一劳永逸的解决方案

我的许多客户对CMS(内容管理系统)有非常不切实际的期望。那些没建CMS的,认为它可以解决所有的内容困境;而建了CMS的,则抱怨它,因为它没有达到预期效果!

的确,CMS可以带来很多好处,包括:

* 减少补充内容的技术壁垒
* 让更多的人来添加和编辑内容,
* 促进更快的更新
* 允许更大的控制。

然而,许多CMS没有它们主人所想的那般灵活。他们不能满足网站管理上不断变化的需求。网站管理人员也抱怨说,他们的CMS很难使用。然而,在许多情况下,这是因为那些使用者没有得到足够的训练,或没有完全足够地使用它。

总之,CMS可能会使内容很容易地被更新,但并不确保内容被不断更新,或确保内容的质量是可以接受的。许多以CMS为基础的网站上仍然有过时的内容或很差的内容。这是因为内部流程没有到位地支持内容投递者。

如果寄希望用CMS解决你网站维护的所有问题,你会感到失望的。

Too Much Content

10. You Have Too Much Content

Part of the problem with content maintenance on large corporate websites is that there is too much content in the first place. Most of these websites have “evolved” over years, with more and more content having been added. At no stage has anybody reviewed the content and asked what could be taken away.

Many website managers fill their website with copy that nobody will read. This happens because of:

A fear of missing something: by putting everything online, they believe users will be able to find whatever they want. Unfortunately, with so much information available, it is hard to find anything.
A fear users will not understand: whether from a lack of confidence in their website or in their audience, they feel the need to provide endless instruction to users. Unfortunately, users never read this copy.
A desperate desire to convince: they are desperate to sell their product or communicate their message, and so they bloat the text with sales copy that actually conveys little valuable information.
Steve Krug, in his book Don’t Make Me Think, encourages website managers to “Get rid of half the words on each page, then get rid of half of what’s left.” This will reduce the noise level on each page and make the useful content more prominent.

Conclusions
Large organizations do a lot right in running their websites. However, they also face some unique challenges that can lead to painful mistakes. Resolving these problems means accepting that mistakes have been made, overcoming internal politics and changing the way you control your brand. Doing so will give you a significant competitive advantage and allow your Web strategy to become more effective over the long term.

10. 你的内容太多了

维护大型网站内容的一个问题是:太多的内容摆在首位。大部分这样的网站都是“进化”多年而来,于是越来越多的内容被添加进去。却没有任何回头审查内容的流程来思考:哪些是可以去掉了的。

很多网站的管理人员以没有人会读的复制的内容来充斥他们的网站。这是因为:

* 害怕失去了一些东西 :把一切都放到线上,他们认为用户将能够找到他们想要。不幸的是,这么多可能的资料中,很难发现任何东西。
* 担心用户不理解 :对网站疑惑是对受众缺乏信心,他们认为有必要提供无穷无尽的讯息给用户。不幸的是,用户大概从来没有阅读过这些。
* 强烈的说服欲望 :他们急于出售他们的产品或传达讯息,所以膨胀化地发出销售信息,而实际上是传递了没有价值的讯息。

史蒂夫·克鲁格,在他的著作《Don’t Make Me Think》中,鼓励网站管理员“去掉每页上一半的话,然后再去掉剩下的一半”。这将降低噪音水平,并让有用的内容在每一页上都更突出。

结论

大型组织在运营自己网站上做了很多正确的事情。然而,他们也面临着一些独特的、可能导致令人痛苦的错误的挑战。这些问题的解决倚赖于接受那些已经犯的错误、克服内部政治以及改变控制品牌的方式。这样做将会给你带来重要的竞争优势,并让你的网络战略在长时间内更加有效。

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重点单词
  • qualityn. 品质,特质,才能 adj. 高品质的
  • majorityn. 多数,大多数,多数党,多数派 n. 法定年龄
  • evolvev. 进展,进化,展开
  • unobtrusiveadj. 不突出的,不显眼的,谦虚的
  • desperateadj. 绝望的,不顾一切的
  • instructionn. 说明,须知,指令,教学
  • convincevt. 使确信,使信服,说服
  • strategicadj. 战略的,重要的,基本的
  • competitiveadj. 竞争的,比赛的
  • inevitablyadv. 不可避免地