The surprising truth of ugly websites
There’s some intuitive answer to this but I can’t figure it out. This seems to be a growing pattern and it annoys the hell out of me when you hear of seemingly-dodgy or untrustworthy sites rolling in $10,000 with a butt-ugly design and a couple of Adsense ads. Perhaps it’s because the ad itself is the most trustworthy part of the site and viewers feel more compelled to click on it? I’m uncertain.
Take for example, the charlemagnes that claim to making thousands and thousands of dollars in AdSense revenue and when you enter and view the site you only find yourself to be bombarded by atrocious design, blinking text, white text on a yellow background and a couple of Adsense ads all touting other sites that speak of making riches with Adsense. It can’t get any closer to a pyramid scheme and yet it seems to be happening more and more. I find it astonishing that excellence scares people.
Maybe, I’ll just let the design of this blog slip from K2 elegance to some formless, early 1990s design just to get better clickthroughs.
Related reading:
http://www.site-reference.com/articles/Website-Development/The-Surprising-Truth-About-Ugly-Websites.html
http://weblogtoolscollection.com/archives/2006/03/22/ugly-sites-earn-more-with-google-adsense/
