It is commonly argued that substance is more important than presentation; and that website content is likely to be judged on the basis of what it expresses, not how ideas are visually dressed up. Although substance is important, it is surprising how much additional influence superficial trappings contribute to users’ perceptions of web content. In fact, research suggest that it’s not enough to just hire talented website developers, editors and analytics experts; but talented designers can influence how much faith users may place in a given website.

Marketing researchers have conducted extensive investigations to understand how a product endorsers’ credibility influences potential customers. Traditional marketing literature suggests an association between visual attractiveness and source credibility. With few exceptions, numerous authors report that attractive communicators are more liked; and this positively impacts the products they are associated with. According to the source attractiveness model, a message’s impact depends on the endorser’s likeability, similarity and attractiveness. When looking at the impact of credibility on purchasing behaviour, researchers have shown that the willingness to buy a product is statistically associated with perceptions of an endorser’s trustworthiness, expertise, and visual attractiveness (Ohanian, 1990).

Given a strong empirical relationship between an endorser’s attractiveness and their source credibility, it appears that that the same trend also holds for websites. In a sense, websites can operate like social actors who make endorsements. Across various investigations, researchers are discovering that website attractiveness is related credibility in a number of interesting ways. First, researchers concluded that website design may have a greater impact on consumers’ attitudes towards websites then their offline perceptions of the organizations. Furthermore, they found a significant association between website design and users attitudes towards websites; in this study, three out of their six dimensions were trust and credibility based (Long and Chiagouris, 2006).

Second, website visuals can trigger a user to form a strong and lasting first impression; and the strength of their emotional reactions to that website can influence their memories of given products. It has been argued that emotionally evocative web designs can increase a website’s influence while strengthening users’ memories of products. These factors are cited as reason why developers strive to develop emotionally evocative websites (Kim et al., 2003). But more importantly, visually attractive websites have been shown to produce a ‘halo effect’ that forms a positive impression in users’ minds which can persist despite successive negative experiences. This first impression can be formed in as little as 50 milliseconds (Lindgaard et al., 2006). These investigations suggest that visually attractive websites deliver an emotional payload that can create a strong first impression which can influence users’ memories and cause them to overlook obvious risks.

Third, one experiment which examined the role of images in content credibility showed an article on health to three groups. The first group who read the article, had a photo of a high-credibility ranked doctor; the second group, a low-credibility ranked doctor; the third, a control group with just the article, but no photo. Even though the article remained the same, subject believed the article with the more credible looking doctor photo was most credible, the text without a photo was second, and the text with a low-credibility image was ranked the least credible (Nguyen and Masthoff, 2007). Amazingly, this research showed how the correct photo could enhance or decrease perceptions of article credibility.

Website design seems to operate like rhetoric, which takes the substance of an argument, spins it, restructures it, and presents it in a more persuasive manner. Over 2,000 years ago, Aristotle argued that persuasive rhetoric could make a weak argument stronger; and it could make a strong argument even stronger. Perhaps, website design operates in the same way, by making content appear more believable than it deserves, and the website operators to be more trustworthy than is warranted.

Given that website design can evoke users’ emotions and impact their credibility judgements, the practical ramification for website operators is simple: web design can impact the success of your online enterprise. It can boost users’ likelihood of believing content; it can influence their probability of trusting the organization operating a website; it can create a strong and lasting first impression. Likewise, poor design can evoke mistrust, disbelief, and disregard. When competing in saturated online environments–by either promoting products, ideas or behaviours–credulity is a factor that can increases or decreases a users’ willingness to believe, act or buy from you, as opposed to your competition.

Obviously, the best way to appear credible is to be credible, by being honest and reliable, and building a reputation over time. However, for honest, but new online ventures, in some cases, potential clients may have no way to figure out if your organization is credible or bogus. And to show these persons you are a credible organization, you’ll have to draw upon all possible means to show that your enterprise is legitimate and reliable. Although there are many things that can be done to foster trust, a professionally designed website, appropriate to your target audiences, is a good start.

The implications for Internet users are also simple: be cautious. Since people’s judgements of credibility is easily manipulated by design and editorial skills, it’s not surprising that the Internet has become an incubator for conspiracy theories, pseudo science, and urban legends that are serving as substitutes for fact-checked and empirically grounded knowledge (Thompson, 2008). And considering that 90% of people cannot identify well designed online scam, even when they’re looking for it (Dhamija et al., 2006), it is no surprise that online crime has become a booming business. Given these trends, it’s best to only extend belief in content form reputable sources; and find ways to verify the legitimacy of sites before believing, buying or acting on their services or information. The traditional signals of criminal intent are very difficult to detect online, and with design-based-credibility easily copy’n pasted, it’s important to exercise caution because looks can be deceiving.

Building a global online network between multiple stakeholders–especially non-profit organizations–can be a daunting task. Although technical considerations are important, contrary to popular belief, the primary challenges have less to do with technology and more to do with human emotions.

While working for the United Nations, in 2002, I visited three organizations that operated top class websites: ELDIS, OneWorld.net and SciDev.net. Each of them had a reputation for excellent news services, publication quality, knowledge management and above all–buzzing online communities. The purpose of my mission was to research their success secrets in order to guide our organization through the process of developing our own global web project. After three days of meetings, which resulted in volumes of notes and technical details, all our discussions boiled down to just eight simple principles, which are summarized below.

First, start with people, not technology. Begin by forming good relationships with strategic stakeholders, players and institutions. It is critical that potential partners feel a strong sense of ownership and loyalty towards the project. After relationships have been established, then the next step is to start approaching the web project and technical issues. Doing things the other way round–a highly risky approach–is to build an amazing website and then afterwards, try to solicit partners who may not understand what they have to gain by joining ‘your’ web project.

Second, invest in either centralized or decentralized trust. Trust is the primary currency of effective online relationships; it allows website operators to quickly and confidently post information without having to spend hours fact-checking every detail. To form trusting relationships, website managers can invest in trust at different points along a continuum between centralized, extended and decentralized. For example, trust can be centrally placed in one chief editor, extended to an editorial team or decentralized across a network of trusted partners (who’ve been pre-screened). Trust impacts a web project’s processing speed, risks and growth potential. In other words, trust operates like a faucet whereby networks with centralized trust can only process a small volume of high credibility content, but assume fewer risks. While networks with lots of decentralized trust can process huge volumes of content; however, they’re going to be at a greater risk for blunders such as disseminating factually incorrect or copyrighted materials.

Third, build global networks through local ownership. The recipe for achieving relevant and meaningful regional content is local ownership and editorial autonomy. Although there is great value in local content, the decision to delegate autonomy to local editors and/or technical staff will always be impacted by strategic, political, economic, trust and content quality factors.

Fourth, decide your point between quantity and quality. Given the same editorial capacity, an editorial team could either process a few high quality content items or many low quality content items. The point between quality and quantity will impact on users’ visit frequency (for frequent publications) and content credibility (for quality materials). Most organizations would prefer to process a high volume of top quality web content; and this is no problem provided unlimited cash and resources are available. However, in the real world, given limited resources, there may be compelling reasons to process more low quality content items rather than a few excellent works, or vice versa–it all depends on the web project’s mission and target audiences.

Fifth, find your place between tight and stale, or loose and lively. Along the continuum between ultra-strict and ultra-loose editorial and web design standards, there is a range between too clinical and too chaotic. A website with too much control can be dull, stale and unappealing to the masses. But also, a site with too much creativity can be confusing. Achieving a dynamic website with mass appeal means striking the right balance between strict standards; while also creating space for spontaneity and creativity.

Sixth, adopt external standards then adapt them to fit your needs. To maintain editorial and technical consistency, it may be easier to adopt well established standards and modify them as needed. For editorial standards, the Associated Press and Economist offer good style guides. For technical standards, there are various programming standards to choose from. Standards empowered staff to learn on their own, reduce dependence on senior staff, gave them a guide when in doubt, and help to identify issues that should be raised with their supervisors.

Seventh, purchase ‘off the shelf’ technology, then ‘home cook’ them to fit your needs. The consensus was to purchase high quality, and flexible, ‘off the shelf’ website solutions; and then extend them to fit the project’s needs. Open source solutions can be a good option as the source code is easily modified; though there can be serious security considerations. On the other hand, purchasing proprietary software may be more secure, but inflexible solutions may force you to consider undertaking messy integration with third party applications.

Eights, stand still or keep moving and learning. The fast pace of online change means that effective web marketing strategies, technology and practices may lead to failure without constantly looking forward, staying ahead of the trends and taking corrective actions. To stay on top of the changing trends, consider dedicating staff to research and development or forward looking roles. Practice ‘iterative learning’, so that after each step in a process, an evaluation is made of the lessons learned, and new knowledge is applied to successive projects. And don’t forget to purchase the latest books and subscriptions to popular magazines.