Marketing & SEO Discussion List - LED Digest

> It is a fact that award winning sites are not always

> the best designed sites for surfing purposes, so the

> questions here are: "In your view, is this award

> winning site well designed for the surfer and

> does it deserve the award?"

    - Tom Aman, Site Design: The Good, Bad, and Ugly

As someone who is actively involved with the Web Marketing Association's WebAward Competition, I could not agree more with this comment.  When it comes to "award winning websites" it really depends on who's award was won. In the early days of the Internet, website awards were a dime a dozen. Remember when being a "Netscape cool site of the day" or "Top 5% of the Internet" was something to strive for - even if they never told anyone what it took to win the recognition.

Many award programs in the advertising world are no more than beauty contests in which all that matters is big budget for a lot of Flash animation and dynamic navigation menus.  An award program without clearly communicated judging criteria, IMHO, belong right up there with the "Bottom 95% of the Net" award.

I am glad to say that the Web Marketing Association has worked hard to insure our judging criteria is more than simply a beauty contest. To win a webaward you are judged on interactivity, ease of use, use of technology, innovation, content and copy writing in addition to design. With that said, a survey of last year's WebAward judges found that lack of a credible design was the single most important factor when scoring a site negatively.

Everyone likes to win awards and they can be a great boost for a marketing effort. But it is important to know how an award was won to determine its relative importance.

Bill Rice, President

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Written by Martha Retallic
January 12, 2006

I agree with Bill on the beauty contest sentiment. If you yearn to win an award that measures more than how pretty your website is, check out the Gold Quill awards offered by the International Association of Business Communicators. To win one of these awards, you have to do a lot more than look good. You must have measurable goals, and prove to the judges that you have achieved them. To learn more, go to www.iabc.com.

With regards from an IABC member who hopes to win a Gold Quill one of these days.

Martha Retallick