Website Tips

You Are Being Judged

Benj Miller

By Benj Miller

Mar 27, 2018
Updated: Oct 23, 2019

Do you know how you are being judged?

Your website.

A few days ago, Kraig Guffey wrote about how we subconsciously judge or leave websites that don’t load fast enough. I leave websites that look old, dated, boring, or otherwise not credible. Some people look for depth of substance in your blog or white papers, while other visitors will go straight to the credibility of your team’s prior experience or the reviews of your product.

Because we have so many options as consumers, we are trained to filter information exceptionally quickly. We judge. We often judge unfairly, but we’re okay with that because we have thousands of other messages that we need to judge waiting for us.

As you think about this, here are three quick website tips:

  1. Learn. Learn about your customers and nail down your customer personas. Based on those personas, you should be able to structure your site’s design, usability, and content to cater to that audience.
  2. Be remarkable. Look like a brand for which your customers would want to have an affinity. Would your buyers wear a polo, hat, or t-shirt with your logo on it? Would they dare share your content with a colleague? A few weak spots in your digital presence are like bitcoin in 2014… you pay a little now or lose a lot downstream.
  3. Ship and iterate. Unlike even ten years ago, we have powerful tools and social feedback to learn quickly where we are succeeding and where we’re missing the mark. Don’t hold back from launching because it isn’t perfect. Do not quit once you launch – that’s just the beginning!
Benj Miller

Post by Benj Miller

Benj Miller is a founder who hates titles, a strategist who can’t sit still, and a coach who feels more like a friend. As Syrup’s Creative Director (and its founder), he turns big ideas into brands people actually remember. He’s part strategist, part artist, and fully allergic to anything that feels generic. Whether he’s shaping a brand’s core idea, building a visual identity, or pushing a website concept one level deeper, he always finds the angle that makes people stop and pay attention.

He spent two decades building Syrup into the company it is today, while also starting, leading, or advising more than ten other companies along the way. That mix of experience shows up in the clarity, honesty, and sharp instincts he brings to every project. When he’s not leading the creative charge, he’s doodling another wild idea or convincing the team that yes, it can be better.