In my experience, few customers visit a website because of its design. There are few companies, organisations or political movements that win or influence their intended target market by having the prettiest website, yet this is usually the greatest bone of contention between Marketing Managers and the web design company.

Unless you sell web design services or design is pivotal to your business, like a boutique hotel, then content and structure are more important than design.

Amazon will never win a Best Website Design Award. What it will win is best and most appropriate content awards, as well as having a killer customer journey.  So the next time you need a new website, perhaps prioritise your time and efforts into creating a:

• Clear online strategy with defined outcomes and objectives
• Customer focused structure with clear customer journey and easy to find call-to-action triggers – such as call us on this number or add to basket or donate now
• Concise and appropriate content.  Use video where it works better than text and animation when explaining complex interactions
• Good website design

It is simple to criticise website design because design is subjective.  I argue that you should spend more time debating what really matters – the objectives of the site, its structure, the customer journey and ultimately the content.