When Web Developers Should Get Back To Basics

I have two objectives in writing this article: the first is to have a small rant about web developers and the second is to prove that by writing relevant content this article will leapfrog ahead of at least one of the sites that these web developers created.

Earlier this week I was trying to find information about two events: the first I will be attending in Swansea and the second was an event where one of my client's had one a prize. Let's take a look at both events.

Lead On 2007 - Liberty Stadium, Swansea
This is an event that is being held in Swansea's Liberty Stadium. It is being organised by the Institute of Directors, Chartered Management Institute, Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development, Wales Management Council and the Chartered Institute of Marketing company called Cazbah. According to the website (more later) the event is geared towards leaders and managers. Speakers include Richard Scase, David Magliano, Dina Matta and Ian Williams, amongst others. It is billed to be one of Wales' top business events of 2007.

Showcase Wales and National Tourism Awards 2007
This Visit Wales (Wales Tourist Board) event was held at Bodelwyddan Castle, North Wales between the 2nd-4th October and according to their website:

The National Tourism Awards for Wales are all about showcasing the very best that Wales has to offer. Turning the spotlight on the stars of Welsh tourism and showing what can be achieved through, hard work, ingenuity and commitment.

At the 3-day event the Showcase Wales and National Tourism Awards 2007 website said that around 250 international travel agents and buyers would be there to do business with Wales' tourism companies.The Awards Ceremony was hosted by the BBC's Huw Edwards and Rob Brydon supplied the comedy.

What are the problems with these site?

Lead On 2007 - the website for this event is almost entirely made up of Jpeg images. We are not talking about standard images here but graphic images of text. The only part of the Lead On 2007 site which is not made up of images is the navigation. Further SEO faux pas include not using keywords like "Swansea" or "Liberty Stadium" in the page titles and no meta descriptions.

I am sure that there will be many people like myself will use Google to get information about the Lead On event in the coming weeks and will be unable to find the site. If you're reading this the web address is: www.leadon2007.com. Good SEO practice would  dictate that  I include a link to their site but this would probably give them a small boost on Google - forget that!

Showcase Wales and National Tourism Awards 2007 - I must admit that over the past week the SEO ranking for this event has climbed up and the site does feature number 1 on Google for the search terms "Showcase Wales" and "tourism awards wales". However, I would say that this has more to do with links from those sites who won awards, press releases and news sites than good SEO on their part.

The big problem I had with this site had to do with its design and content. I felt that for a major Wales Tourism event the Showcase Wales website was, and is, a major disappointment. It had no WOW! factor, lack of good images and information was generally very old. Let's take an example - I was interested to find out who the finalists for awards were and instead of the names was offered an application form (entires closed in June!).  I won't discuss some of the issues that potential buyers may have had.

As for trying to find press releases on the site I have given up and now am relying on my client's own.

One of the problems with sites such as this is that PR and Marketing companies try to create web sites either in-house or get graphic designers to design sites for them. And invariably, these people are usually ill-equipped to do projects like this - they don't have the necessary web design, usability or SEO skills to do projects much justice.

The Solution

If you're looking for ways to create good event sites, take a peek at the Future of Web Apps site. The Le Web 3 website and the Search Marketing Expo site offer straightforward, easy-to-use examples of how to build event sites. The French site was actually built using the same technology as this site and aside from design the cost of the site (except booking) was probably under £79 per year!

Update
For the terms "Lead on 2007 Swansea" this site is number 1.