If You Could Change One Thing

"My kitchen?" I responded. "I don't know... maybe more counter space?" The Home Depot employee smiled at me and realized after a few minutes that I, a person who cooks so little, would not be a great target for a kitchen remodel. But his question had certainly grabbed my attention on aisle 6 and pulled me out of my search for electrical tape.

"If you could change one thing about your kitchen, what would it be?" he asked.

Now honestly, I care very little about my kitchen, I just want it to be clean. But the situation immediately made me consider the question in regard to my website. And so I'll pose it to you, guessing that if you are reading this, you may have a business website or personal blog.

"If you could change one thing about your website, what would it be?"

I personally have an immediate answer to this - speed! I want a faster website and am trying to determine if it's worth the cost to move from a general shared hosting service (such GoDaddy or BlueHost) to a hosting platform that specializes on WordPress sites (such as WP Engine).

So I'm mulling this over now. And since I'm in the middle of a busy job with a client site about to launch in a month, I won't be able to make a hosting change to my own site immediately, but it's back on my radar screen as a high priority for October.

Your "one thing" to change might be:

  •  - ease of use
  •  - bio
  •  - examples of client work
  •  - images

Instead of getting overwhelmed about the many things you'd like to change, how could you change that one thing that bothers you the most? I suspect if it bothers you, it may also trouble your website visitors, who you don't want to frustrate. I promise that your visitors want your site to be easy to use and your information to be up-to-date.

As website usability expert Steve Krug explains in his bestselling book Don't Make Me Think, "...it's useful to imagine that every time we enter a Web site, we start out with a reservoir of goodwill. Each problem we encounter on the site lower the level of that goodwill."

Common problems I see on websites are speed, inconsistent navigation, broken links and outdated information. If you lose a visitor's goodwill, I suspect it will be harder to get them to like you, trust you, buy from you or connect with you in some other desirable way. Making your website user-friendly with accurate information matters!

Now, what's that one thing you really want need to change?

Thank you, Home Depot, for your help not only caring for my physical home but also my virtual home.