10 Things We Hate About Websites (And Examples of Ones We Like)

In this episode of Spiraling Up inspired by the hit 1999 movie, "10 Things I Hate About You", Austin, Mary-Blanche, and Joe dive into the top ten things they hate about professional services websites. They discuss issues from huge navigation menus to poor SEO optimization and offer illustrative examples of websites that are doing it right. 

Hinge's Art Director Christian Baldo, also joins the show to share his perspective on why brands (and the world) has gone gray. And don't miss the unique closing segment where Joe reads a heartfelt poem about these website woes. 

View the Hinge website portfolio here: https://hingemarketing.com/portfolio#website-design

CHAPTERS:
00:00 Intro + Banter
04:22 Pivotal Story: Is the World Losing Color?
15:53 Complex Main Navigation
21:18 Bad Homepage Headlines
25:36 Stock Imagery
30:24 Websites With No Filtering Tools
33:07 Lack of Case Stories
37:16 Lack of Expert Bio Pages
39:40 Attributing Thought Leadership to the Company
43:33 Lack of Video
47:40 Lack of Employer Branding
51:09 Poorly Optimized For Search
55:40 List Recap
56:38 Slam Poet Joe

Transcript

Austin McNair: 0:00

in today's episode of Spiraling Up, what do our team members hate about professional services websites? But first, have you been feeling a little bit gray today? There's a reason and we're gonna talk about why. Welcome everybody. This is spiraling up with Hinge. All right, everyone. Welcome to another episode of the Spiraling Up Podcast. The podcast for professional services marketers and business leaders. Where professional services marketing comes to life. My name is Austin McNair, and as always, I'm joined by my colleagues and co-hosts, Mary Blanche Kramer. Hey, MB

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 0:40

Hey, hey.

Austin McNair: 0:41

and Joe Pope. Joe, good to see you again.

Joe Pope: 0:44

Good to see you again. I'm excited to spend some more time with you, Austin.

Austin McNair: 0:48

We've been spending a lot of time together recently. We'll talk about that. Uh, but as we get started, I, I want, I wanna say thank you to our listeners and all of those watching on YouTube. Give us a, like, subscribe to the channel, or even better, leave us a comment. Let us know what you think. What questions do you have? What kind of topics, uh, do you want us to talk about in future episodes? We are, this is a new podcast and we want to hear from you in terms of the things that you wanna learn about, yeah, here we are, guys. Another episode. I'm super excited.

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 1:14

Yeah, me too. You know, I forgot you guys have been spending a lot of time together. Uh, y'all had a presentation recently. In Nashville. I wanna hear, tell me about that.

Austin McNair: 1:24

Half in, half out in Nashville.

Joe Pope: 1:26

half in, half out, we, Austin and I both traveled to Nashville, but only Austin came through the Internets. I was there in person. Uh, we had a, uh, yeah, we had a, uh, a now client prospect of hinges that, uh, wanted us to come in and do a presentation for their leadership team. Uh, we had an idea for a topic that they really loved, but it was not one that I felt super comfortable with. So we, we, uh, we brought in the expert in this circumstance. It's like anyone who listens to this podcast knows Austin, knows all things, hinges research in terms of the high growth study buyer behavior. And this is a group that's, uh, in the process of bringing some of these methodologies into a leadership group and wanted some. Some good old fashioned hinge research. So yeah, we worked together and created a uh, presentation that involved being half in a room and half on a screen. I think it went well. Austin, what'd you think?

Austin McNair: 2:16

Yeah, I, I honestly, I thought it went better than I expected. I mean, I was a little bit nervous being on the listening end. Um, I was grateful that I wasn't the only one in the digital conference room that I. Similarly, they had some team members that couldn't be there in person, so it didn't, I didn't feel like totally on an island, although, like in the room, I could tell Joe, like, you know, you were standing, you were kind of commanding the stage kind of com, you know, guiding the

Joe Pope: 2:42

way too kind, but thank you.

Austin McNair: 2:44

No, it was, but it worked out really well. And I mean, we, I think it was an interesting ex like experiment to kind of navigate the challenge like the, the experience of like half, half of a virtual presentation, but also the in-person and Joe, I mean, for you being there in person, that had to have been like worth the experience of traveling down there and spending time with the client. Because I, I, we could give, we, and we do give presentations virtually. All day. Right? Every day. But like the actual, like getting one of us to be in the room there, I have to imagine You think there's some good value there?

Joe Pope: 3:19

Absolutely. I, I think we've talked, we've, this has been a reoccurring topic, but you know, as. As marketing continues to evolve, COVID clearly was the gasoline on the digital fire, right? Where everybody wanted their virtual town hall or virtual webinar, whatever it might be, but you know. We're getting back to some of the basics in terms of professional services, and that is bought based on trust, expertise, relationships, things along those lines. And it, nothing says relationship, like flying down and, and meeting with people in person and, uh, you know, enjoying some Brazilian food. They ordered Brazilian food in honor of our virtual friend

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 3:55

No way.

Joe Pope: 3:56

They did?

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 3:57

Yeah. I was wondering how you guys were gonna kind of riff off of, because you're so good at kind of riffing off of each other when you're in a presentation room together, whether that's together virtually or together in person. So I was really interested to hear how, you know, kind of during the, the one-on-one would would go off. That sounds like it went well.

Austin McNair: 4:14

Yeah, it, it worked out. Joe and I have spent a lot of time together. We're gonna spend more time in this episode. Uh, we've got a great, uh, session planned here. We're gonna talk about the 10 things that we hate about. Professional services websites. But first, Mary Blanche. I know that we have a pivotal story that we want to get to. Why don't you introduce that for us?

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 4:34

The world is losing its color and it's a quiet shift happening all around us. We're seeing a real move away from bold, vibrant maximalism, and towards a much more muted gray scale minimalism. UX Magazine recently spotlighted this trend, and once you see it, you can't unsee it. Take Apple, for example, clean lines, softwood tones, open spaces, and even McDonald's has made the shift. Their restaurants once boasted the classic red roof and bright yellow interior. But these days, most locations are rocking the neutral palettes, so it's a complete vibe shift from before. But this isn't just a design preference. It's tied to bigger forces, things like economic shifts and a desire for simplicity, quality, and sustainability over flashy excess. It's a to a turn towards timelessness, and it's reshaping how brands show up today. So since none of us here, none of us co-hosts are experts in design, we've brought in a special guest today, hinges art director Christian Baldo. So Christian, what do you make of the shift towards gray?

Christian Baldo: 5:42

Well, hello. When did you get here? Thanks so much for having me on here. I couldn't agree more. Uh, it's very obvious this shift towards minimalism towards a more subdued, uh, color palette, toward more refinement, toward more, uh. Overall elegance and classiness. Uh, that trend is very, evident in lots of different contexts, lots of different arenas, whether it's product design, whether it's website design, everywhere, really fashion, um, very distinct trend, toward a more minimalist aesthetic.

Austin McNair: 6:21

Christian, so I, I want to hear more from you on like this whole theme of like., Is it minimalism? Is it all about like accessibility and like being able to read things or like, is it just safer at this point? Because I can't, tell me your experience. I feel like in client meetings when we like kick off a new website or a new brand, there's a lot of people that are just like, I just really like that clean aesthetic that, that, that look of like, you know, where it's really easy to read. Like how do you as a designer like hear that, but then also. Are you encouraging folks to go beyond that a little bit in a way? Like how do we not feel so gray?

Christian Baldo: 6:55

I see this as a trend and it was all as, as with all, all trends, they come and go. We're currently in a, in a space now where, Black and white is seen as, uh, as opulent. You know, it's, it's seen as high class, it's seen as premium. have a high ticket item like an iPhone or like really expensive sneakers. So you're getting those from brand. You're getting those from brands like Apple. You see it on Adidas, you see it on, uh, Nike. You see it on the Tesla website. You go to their, any of their homepage, it's black and it's white. You want people to understand that this is a high quality, revolutionary, innovative product, and a lot of brands followed suit because that's. Why wouldn't you want to, uh, portray your brand with that same sort of notion? Uh, we want our customers to pay this price that we're asking for, let them feel like that's what they're getting. And so the black and whites, the grays, the neutral colors, it, it represents a sort of reservedness. It gives the brands these, uh, this feeling that we don't need to be loud. To show that we know that this is a quality product, that we know what we're doing, that you're going to get an an excellent product that's worth the, the premium that you're gonna be paying for it. Now that being said, that did set forth a trend for companies that aren't really, you know, uh uh.

Joe Pope: 8:23

That aren't Apple.

Christian Baldo: 8:25

That aren't exactly right. They're not Apple. Um. Now something else that is, that I believe is keeping this sort of aesthetic fresh comes back to this idea of legibility, of accessibility. As we're growing more and more sensitive to, as a society, to, making sure that, uh, materials that we, release products in the wild, need to be. Easily accessible and legible to a much broader audience. The idea of contrast and simplicity, visual simplicity has become even outside of style, just sort of a, a, a necessity of, of life, of general design. And so you're not going to, from a design standpoint, you're not gonna get more contrast than black on white or vice versa.

Joe Pope: 9:15

you're kind of referring to something we run into quite a bit, especially with things like a DA compliance with websites and other areas, you're not gonna get more. Accessible than black on white, right?

Christian Baldo: 9:26

I am surprised that it's, it's continued on this far, um, in terms of style, in terms of fashion, in terms of popularity of, you know, popular culture. However, one thing that I feel like is keeping it lasting is this idea of accessibility and that really weaving into our everyday lives, not just in terms of. Being able to read text on websites or reading signs and, and things like that. From a utilitarian standpoint, I think it's really weaving its way into popular culture.

Austin McNair: 10:00

So Christian for, you know, keeping in mind the benefits, right? Which you've outlined here. Like what. Are the way, what, what are some things for you as an art director where you're kind of encouraging our clients to be a little bit more bold, right? To not maybe play it just safe with, you know, the minimalist theme, but to actually texturize and kind of propel like the, the, the, the, the brands forward.

Christian Baldo: 10:26

it's a tricky question. It's a tricky situation that we're in, um, currently from a design standpoint. Because as I mentioned in terms of, accessibility, these things have become a necessity. So using black and white, I, I don't, that's not something that's going to be going away anytime soon. However, keeping that in mind, differentiation is something that we're always coming back to in terms of brand, in terms of messaging, in terms of visual, uh, identity,. As the black and white minimalist aesthetic is applied to and, and adopted by brands across the board, regardless of what it is they're providing or what it is they're manufacturing, uh, it's going to become, like I said, less and less a special thing. so color is definitely one of those ways that we push our, we push our clients, um. Towards standing out, not, not even just amongst their competitors, but at this point standing out as a brand to the world.

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 11:30

Do you have an example of a recent project that you've done that you're proud of, that that kind of does? Just, just that what you were outlining.

Christian Baldo: 11:37

Yeah, so that's a great question. Um, you know, in a lot of the work that we've been doing in most recent past, we have had clients approach us saying, we want the Apple look. We want that, we want that minimalist, that stark, that, uh, that classy aesthetic that Apple established years ago. Obviously we deliver on that. We'll give them options that really, uh, encapsulate that, that, that sort of style aesthetic, black and white, lots of, uh, negative space, letting the imagery, uh, hold all the, the weight of, uh, visual presence. Then in contrast to that, we'll also provide them one where, an option to, to consider where we're really pushing that and whether it's, uh, going, it, it, whether it's adding a, a, a splash of color or really going full force into bucking the trend and going far bolder with the color choices. Uh, with the color strategy. Funny enough, in, in our most recent history, the clients have been seeing where we're coming from in terms of saying, this

Joe Pope: 12:50

They're going the, they're going the color.

Christian Baldo: 12:52

Yeah. These are the trends we're seeing. This is what's been going on for the past 10, 15, however many years. This is a great way to stand out. This is the, a great way to establish differentiation. You're brave and innovative enough to really push this. Let's do this. And there they've been all in. And so a lot of the sites that we've been working on for our clients recently have been. Far bolder in color. Now, that's not to say we're, you know, I, I grew up as a, a child of the eighties, and so that was all neons and, free floating geometric shapes and things like that. That's not what we're sharing with our clients exactly. As, as near and dear to my heart as that aesthetic is, We're still making sure that the, the overall presence is that of professionalism, is that of sophistication, is that of innovation, but it's with a strategy that takes us outside of the, the current trend that's, that we're still in

Joe Pope: 13:53

Clearly it's working for us Christian, and the results are, and the awards that you guys win, and I put behind me on this backdrop,

Christian Baldo: 14:00

that one.

Joe Pope: 14:02

it's somewhere up there.

Austin McNair: 14:04

You guys gonna send me one of those things? I want one. I want to take credit for Christian's Hard work.

Joe Pope: 14:09

That's what I do every day.

Austin McNair: 14:12

Well, Christian, we know you're a busy guy. Um, thank you for taking the time to talk to us about this topic, uh, super interesting. I really want us to plan another design oriented pivotal story so we can have you back on soon. Uh, thanks man. We appreciate your time.

Christian Baldo: 14:27

Well, this has been great. You know where to find me. I'm always, I'll always come hang out with y'all. It's like being at the cool kids table.

Joe Pope: 14:34

Thanks man. Appreciate you.

Christian Baldo: 14:35

right. Thanks

Austin McNair: 14:36

Thanks, Christian. All right, and for our listeners, let's turn to our next segments where we're gonna stick on the topic of design a little bit. We're gonna talk about 10 things that we hate about professional services, websites, All right. So we all know that when it comes to your professional services firm, there's probably not a single thing more important to your marketing than your company's website. And I can say that at Hinge we haven't just designed websites, but we have audited and reviewed. Thousands of professional services websites at this point. So now I'd like us to turn to a new segment, uh, inspired by the, uh, early two thousands. Joe, you're our kind

Joe Pope: 15:21

1999. 1999.

Austin McNair: 15:24

Uh, we're gonna channel the energy of the movie. 10 Things I Hate About You, Joe, who was in that movie.

Joe Pope: 15:31

Oh, let's go through it. Joseph Gordon Levitt. Uh, RIP. Heath Ledger. Julia Styles,

Austin McNair: 15:36

That is the energy we're channeling here from 10 things I Hate About You. We're gonna give you guys 10 things that we hate about professional services websites. So, Joe, Mary Blanche, I asked you guys to prepare for us, you know, some of your pet peeves. Um. And let's build our list of 10 things that we hate about professional services websites. Mary Blanche, I am so excited. I want you to start and kick us off here. What is one thing that you hate about professional services websites?

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 16:06

All right, Austin, I'm gonna come out of the gate, um, pretty strong on this one. This is definitely, uh, a long time pet peeve of mine, um, personally, and I think, think for many people, but, um, an overcrowded, uh, or overly. Large navigation menu, um, is hands down, like one of the biggest things I'll notice right off the bat. Um, you know, if, if you have too many options for a visitor, they're trying to find what they're looking for. You are giving them too many options. You have poorly organized categories. It, it creates this decision fatigue for a visitor just, just right off the bat. And it can make it, it, can make it difficult for them to, you know, quickly find that the information that they've come to your site. To find and, you know, so that that can make the user frustrated and kind of in a worst case scenario, they can, they can become so frustrated that, you know, they potentially just abandon your, abandon your site altogether. Um, and then, you know, considering how much all of us. Use our phones every single day. I mean, I know for myself a lot of, when I'm looking for information, going to a website, I'm actually on my phone. And the mobile experience that you create when you have these large, complex navigation menus, it's, it's just not great. So for me, that's a, that one's a a no brainer. Top of top of my list.

Joe Pope: 17:28

It. What, what comes to mind is the fact that professional services organizations, a lot of times are just looking for, what's that next new service. Whether they went out and bought another company that was doing it and folded them in, or they're just launching it as a new initiative. And I, I think what's ended up happening is you've got these. Decision makers or groups of decision makers who are just thinking to themselves, well, we need to be on the website too. And then that leads to the next thing. And then, oh, well we also have a specialty industry that offers this as a service, so let's add that there. And then next thing you know, a company that's like, you know,$20 million, not even like a massive company. They've got more. Things on their menu than a Deloitte, and that decision fatigue is, is real. And we see that all the time. And when we actually start to look at the data and when we're kicking off a website project, we, we actually go in and look at what are your user behaviors and organizations that come to us with a website. A lot of times to rebuild it, but a website that's got a giant menu full of a hundred freaking options, first off, nobody's going to all of them and second off their bounce rates are higher.

Austin McNair: 18:32

Joe, you kind of just made the point. Uh, so for each of these, we're gonna provide an example of who's doing it well, that you can go turn to, if you're watching on YouTube. We're gonna be sharing these on the screen here. If you're listening, we'll try to describe what we're looking for. So, Joe, I love how you, you, you kind of gave the Deloitte example, but in, in this case, we're actually looking at the Accenture website. I, I, I, I do, I have brought this up before when talking to clients, you know, this is a huge management consulting company, right? And if Accenture can afford to have a navigation bar that is, you know, this is still pretty big, but it is alphabetized and organized. And the top level mag, uh, navigation is really just four options. What we do, what we think. So that's their insight section. Who we are. And careers, they were able to keep it real simple. Right? Um, and you know, there's a lot, you know, under what we do, right? There's a lot of capabilities listed. They've got their industries listed as well. It's a pretty big list, but again, this is one of the biggest companies in the world, right? And I think the idea that we're talking about here, principally, right? Mayor Blanche, is just simplicity. Ease. Ease of navigation, right? We don't want there to be a lot of friction and we don't want to be inventing like new thing. We're not calling things something new or like trying to be super clever with our navigation. It's usually a place where it's just straight to the point. We want to get people where they want to go Quick. Anything else to add here?

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 19:57

Yeah, I mean, I, I was just gonna add, I mean, you want it to be, you want it to be intuitive and you know, even on this, you know, they're taking the user through the journey and the correct order of operations. I think another thing we see often too is trying to get a tertiary level also worked into a navigation. Right? Um, so clearly when you go to these pages, there are gonna be additional opt options for you to choose from. Um. But kind of taking the user through the correct, um, journey, order of operations so that they're not overwhelmed from, from the jump. So yeah, such is a great example.

Joe Pope: 20:32

It was interesting. I just pulled Deloitte outta thin air and I wanted to just verify what their navigation four options as well. And they're pretty much the same four options though there. Our thinking button is, uh, the third of, instead of uh, like the second one, I think, on the Accenture site. So these large organizations are creating navigational simplicity. Why should an organization that isn't as large make it into a complexity that would potentially detract the types of clients they want to have more of? And also with careers being important, obviously the types of folks that they wanna have come work for em,

Austin McNair: 21:10

Love it. All right, so let's, let's that, let's put that at the top of the list. Huge navigation menus. Number one

Joe Pope: 21:17

kill'em.

Austin McNair: 21:18

websites, I've got the second one. This one, uh, is close to my heart. Um, because it involves positioning, it involves messaging, it involves differentiation, it involves clarity. And so the thing, the next thing that I hate about professional services websites are bad homepage headlines. Um, I can't tell you guys how many websites that I've gone to that feature generic. Vague or, and in like a different direction, like overly clever headlines like trying to make like a pun or something. Um, and it doesn't immediately communicate who the firm is. What is their value proposition? What do they do, right? I, I, I think we all understand at this point that your website has essentially three seconds. To tell a user who's coming into your homepage that you, that what you do and who you are, right? It, it has to happen immediately. Um, especially right now, we're seeing a big dip in traffic coming to other pages, right? So if you have a blog and maybe traditionally you got a lot of, um, traffic to your blog, well. Google is now making that a lot harder for you. Right? So most of the people coming to your website are going to be entering into your homepage, and your homepage needs to clearly tell people who you are and what you do. and it can be aspirational too. So for the example I wanted to give, uh, I brought up one of our clients, Hewitt ERs and the, uh, headline that we put at the beginning of their home, their website says, we're designing the landmarks of tomorrow. I like that they are a design agency. They, they, they work, they're engineers. They're construct, they, they, they're architects. They do, they, they build the world. They're building the landmarks of tomorrow. And there's something there that's a little bit like aspirational and like iconic about what they're saying. But it's very clear what they're doing and what their mission is. Um, and then the, the, the call to action there is to see their work. So they're designing the landmarks of tomorrow. You click there, it takes you to their project portfolio, which is, is really beautiful and well laid out with some good filtering tools. Uh, what do you guys think about bad homepage headlines?

Joe Pope: 23:31

you were talking about aspirational and like the thought that comes to mind is the different tests for something that is a differentiator. And you know, you should be very much trying to differentiate yourself on a homepage. And a lot of times people then take that too far and put a word salad of. Uh, you, I don't know, biggest tropes that you can make up in business, right? Uh, one thing that you'll see on accounting advisory firms is we will be your trusted advisor, right? Or like something along those lines, which, you know, if everybody says it, then nobody actually says it, right? It's just not something that actually differentiates you. It's not so not something that people care about and they're buying journey. They care about working with experts that are gonna solve their specific challenges. So the Hewitt dollars example is awesome because if I'm thinking about an iconic. Landmark right here. Landmark. That's something that's gonna stand the test of time, and I'm working to think through the process of what it's gonna be like to get that type of setup. That's my aspiration for what my project is going to be. This is a group that's coming right out of the gate and saying that's what we do. I.

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 24:32

Yeah. I mean, I think the, the last point I would make, I mean, we've talked a lot about, um, like the, the verbiage and the differentiators, but the way I like that you picked this example, Austin, because it's not only in the. The words right off the bat, you know, you know who they are and what they do. So it's also the tie in with the imagery and you pair those two things together. Um, you know, and, and, you know, within that first three seconds right off the bat, you know, the site that you're on and, and, and what they're all about. And then Jody, to your point on the, uh, the trusted. Advisor piece. I mean, I can't tell you how many websites I've been to, and the copy is clear on what they do, but they have a huge main stage image and it's, you know, two people at a table, you know, talking and it's, I, I don't I from that bit, I mean, for as much real estate as that takes up right there on the front, until I get down to that secondary level of, of reading what that copy is underneath, I still don't know. So Hewitt soler, bam, right out the gate, the words, the imagery, and you know, in the first three seconds. So yeah. Good, good choice.

Austin McNair: 25:36

I think you were touching on our, our next one that Joe submitted. So Joe, why don't you tell us about one thing that you hate about professional services websites?

Joe Pope: 25:44

I hate stock imagery. No, I'm kidding. Uh, stock imagery is reality, but I think the thing that really stands out is when it's just uninspired that there's no direction behind it. Visual design of a website is bland or it's dated. There's no aesthetic that aligns with the personality, for example, that an organization's trying to bring to the table. We've asked this question as an organization for 15 plus years, the research the Hinge has done, and it is, you know, what is the amount of folks that are gonna go to your website before they reach out and talk to you? We are well into the nineties of the percentage here. I mean, people are going to go to your website, so if you are. Completely ignoring that part of the buying journey, whether you are a fortune level company or a single shingle, if you're not thinking about somebody going to your website and what it looks like and the experience that it's giving from the jump, you're, you are already behind the eight ball and because your competitors will.

Austin McNair: 26:37

So Joe, before we show, you know who's doing it well, I know you have a bone to pick with a particular professional services industry

Joe Pope: 26:44

The government contracting space is by far the worst offenders in this, where they have spun up, no offense to Wix, but you know, your Wix or your square websites from 10-year-old, 15-year-old templates. And the first thing that comes to their mind is, well, how, what do we populate our visuals with? And it seems that they all kind of settle on. One of three things are sometimes all three, uh, generic images of dc not landmarks, although sometimes landmarks, but like those brutalist style, I just think of like the FBI building for example, which I think they're trying to get outta that building as quickly as possible. Right. But the, uh, the idea of just this really ugly type building, uh, that that's gotta be for some reason on their homepage, that's one. American flags, and I'm a Big America guy, so like, don't get me wrong there, but you know, government contractors, you do not need to immediately plaster your, the, the stars and stripes on your homepage because everybody else has done that already. The third one, Eagles. Eagles always seem to find their way in there. Another America thing, but just good bird, but not needed. I'm not passionate about this at all.

Austin McNair: 27:51

I remember from our conversation with Megan in our previous episode, like, you know, she talked about that need to communicate about being about the mission, you know, staying mission critical. What is the outcomes, uh, for government contractors? I think all that's true. I think, Joe, what you're saying though is like there's still a degree of like, I. Inspiration that can be breathed into a brand, right, into a visual look and feel. And in that space and really a lot of the professional services spaces, we see it a lot with CPA firms as well, engineering companies. Um, there is just a tendency to just kind of, I. Go into some of the safer, well beaten design paths, and that's why I was really happy that we could talk to Christian on this episode. So, uh, for, for who's doing it well, um, I picked Teal and Team, which is an example we've, we've looked at before, but this is one of our award-winning websites. Um, that Christian, Kristin, our whole design team, had a huge hand in. Um, kind of, um, I won't say like overhauling this brand didn't need an overhaul. It needed some touchups and just some other design assets to really kind of make their existing portfolio of work really shine through. And when you go through there, um, the work they do everything from including the video there at the top to just little pieces like that are bright and colorful. We talk about kind of the, the trend towards gray earlier in this episode. Like. He mentioned that we've had some clients recently that have leaned into being a little bit bolder recently, and Teal and team has definitely fallen into that category. And just the way that images are styled across the website, they really pop little textures here behind their logo. Um, just really nice things that build like an inspiring visual brand and, um, communicate. Sophistication, elegance and originality like this really can differentiate your brand, um, if everything's just kind of muted and looking the same. Um, so that's who we chose for, uh, inspired Art Direction.

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 29:43

Yeah, I was gonna say the caliber of their work. I mean, it really shines through in the imagery. And when you look at that video, like right there on the homepage, it really like, they use their images to create that video that kind of take you on like an, like an, an experience right From the right, from the get go.

Joe Pope: 29:59

And, and just to pull the curtain back a little bit, the, there's a lot of both custom imagery and stock imagery in here, and you really wouldn't be able to tell the difference. Uh, and that's, that's a, that's a key thing here. I know I started this whole segment by kind of poking fun at stock, but realistically, when done correctly and woven within things like a portfolio section, that, and be like, you just called out. You can really make something look special,

Austin McNair: 30:24

Well, the reality is that not every, not every company is a, uh, interior design firm, so that is an advantage that this particular client has. Some companies are, you know, uh, data, you know, technology companies or, you know, implementation specialists. So it does take a little bit of creativity in terms of, you know, bringing some of those brands to life. But is the investment worth it? We would say yes for the reason that, uh, Joe mentioned. Alright guys, the next thing I have on the list is a website with no filtering tools. I, I, I can't stand this. And this is something that, that, that happens all the time, especially with websites that have, you know, been around for a long time and they're, you know, maybe fast growing companies. Joe, earlier you mentioned like m and a, uh, and sometimes these websites, um. They get really big. There's a lot of content. In some cases there's really great content on the website, but they provide users with no way to kind of filter the information in the way that would get them to the right content faster. Uh, so who I have here is I have example of another. Hinge client here, Hansen Professional Services. Um, and this was a really big, uh, emphasis point for this team and our website design team here of how do we coal or how do we bring together a lot of this concept that they had created over the years from many different blogs, many different spaces, and really bring, um, a unified experience, uh, and make it easy to find content quickly. So here's some examples of where they do that. If you go to their work section, so their project portfolio. Not only can you ser search by service, you can search by market. You can search by location. Really helpful. Well, how about when you go over to insights? You go over to Insights. Okay, we have a feature. This is a version of filtering, a featured item, you know, kind of guiding the user experience. What might they be interested in, but then also. What market are they in again, or what blog or kind of service area might they be looking for? So if you're looking for, um, you know, some content on the airport planning space, for example, boom, there you go. They've got a couple of options there for that. These kind of filtering tools allow users to get to where they need to go quickly. And I'd say at this point, man, that is a must have and I hate when websites don't have it. It's such a missed opportunity. Any thoughts on that?

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 32:49

Yeah, I would go as far as to say it's like whether a site has 20 pieces of content or 200 pieces of content. I mean, that filtering is so key for the user, like allowing them to be intentional about the information that they're looking for. Um, yeah. I'm, I'm with you, Austin. It's, it's a must have.

Austin McNair: 33:07

All right, Joe, the next one is in your court here. What's the next thing that you hate about professional services websites?

Joe Pope: 33:14

Well, I talk for a living, which people listening to this podcast might question that choice as a career. But I I will say that one thing that I always lean on when I'm talking, especially to new prospects and so forth, is the idea of having stories of success. Of how Hinge has potentially been, uh, led an organization like them, for example, to success in the past and organizations on professional services, uh, professional services organizations that don't make a commitment to talking about their success on their website. Those are groups that are completely missing a connection point in how buyers buy the types of things that we sell, right? And so when you go to a website and you don't find. Past performance, you don't find case stories or even just examples of the types of successes that they might have, because you'll sometimes run across groups that have, uh, confidentiality, for example, like that they're, you weren't able to specifically name an organization. Well, you can usually say a company of this size in this industry, in this state. Like, I mean, you don't need to completely preclude yourself from being able to point to your successes. We just know from experience and certainly anybody who. Talks, sales and BD know that if you're not able to talk about the types of things you've done in the past, you're not gonna be selected. You're gonna fall behind. And a website being your number one place to house this type of information, it needs to be front and center. I mean, we talked about the teal and team example. That's, that's a great one. I know there's other organizations too. Uh, and Austin, I think you're pulling one up right now, right? That have done this well.

Austin McNair: 34:54

Yeah, so it's interesting to me, Joe, that you, you brought up the, the kind of issue of like the NDAs and you have to anonymize case stories. That is a solution. What's interesting to me though, is that it's not, it's not necessarily a problem that I'm seeing the biggest. Players in the space have. So I'm always kind of challenging our clients, like, can we find solutions either before we sign new engagements that kind of allow us to have access to tell us more stories? Or are there ways that we can have curated examples, um, that we can still include? Like can we, uh,'cause I do think there is something important. Well, you can anonymize a case story, I would say. That the best and kind of shining examples out there are the ones that can put a face to the name, right. And so for this reason, we're kind of dialing in here on the Slalom website. Slalom's a huge consulting firm. They have a very elegant website and strong user experience. A lot of our clients use Slalom as an example of, um, kind of a user experience and a style that they admire. One thing that we really kind of reference about them is the way that they feature customer stories. Um, they put customer stories up here in the main navigation that tells you one thing, even though this isn't like an engineering company that needs to prove, you know, the work that they've developed or an architect showing, you know, the things they've designed. This is a consulting company and stories is right there at the top, inside their main navigation. And when you go and look at these stories, um, they aren't putting names to these. Salesforce clat, Melbourne Indigenous Transition School. I mean that it's big and small, in other words, and clicking into these, um, I mean these are, you can tell they've put a lot of investment. To making these stories interesting, visually interesting, and backing them up with, you know, at a glance and stats, um, things that, um, really speak to the issues that they solved in the engagement. Um, these kinds of case stories, like you say, Joe, I, I think they're really essential in the business development space, but as we've been talking about. Potential buyers will check out your website ahead of time, and this is often a section that they'll go to'cause they wanna see the proof, they wanna see that you have the past performance and the experience to solve the problems that they, uh, that they have. mayor Blanc, I think you've got the next one.

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 37:16

Yeah, I've got the next one and I think it actually, um, ties really well into the one that we were just talking about, being that it was past performance, so, um, lack of expert. Bio pages is, is a big one for me and failing to highlight, uh, your leaders' individual expertise or their industry contributions. Um, I know for myself, you know, when I'm going to a website, I. Or if I'm a prospect and I'm, I'm going to, uh, you know, going to a company's website, I, I wanna know who I'm working with, you know, and, you know, I wanna know that the, the company, the company has expertise in, in the service that, that I'm looking for. But, um, particularly in professional services, I wanna know who, who those people are and what, what their expertise is. Like who am I gonna be engaging with? I see you just pulled up ml NR. So this is a really great example. It kind of goes to our earlier, um, discussion on filtering. I mean, ML NR has a ton of, of team members and this actually allows you to drill into the, if there's a specific, if you just wanna look at the, um, people from a particular industry, you can do that. And then with the accordion functionality that you're pulling up now, um, just another really easy way to get. The very specific information you want or all of the information about them. So the ability to read it all or specifically what's important to, to the user. Um, and then I, I always like to say, you know, the expertise is important, but if somewhere in a bio you can find a way to, to draw a connection, you know, a personal interest, something that, anything you can do to create a connection, it it, it goes further than you think.

Austin McNair: 38:56

I totally agree. And the big objection we get Mary Blanche is, well, if we feature our people on our website, that increases the likelihood that headhunters are gonna come and they're gonna steal'em. They're gonna find'em, they're on our website, and they're gonna start poaching them away from our company. Um, and we've been getting that objection since I started at Hinge and it just. That the trend though, just has not changed. That the fastest growing companies, the ones that are investing in their people, they are the, they are highlighting the expertise of their people and they are even have a strategy to get their people out there and building more visibility for the company. Um, so the benefits, I have to say that they outweigh the costs

Joe Pope: 39:37

Greatly, greatly outweigh.

Austin McNair: 39:40

All right. Actually, mb you just hit on one. That for me is my next thing that I hate about professional services websites. It is when great thought leadership content has been published on the website, but instead of being attributed to a person, it is attributed to just the company. It's not attributed to the actual expert that, um. That spent time writing it. Uh, and again, I, I think this is one of those things that it, it's a missed opportunity, like I mentioned. You know, what do we see instead? People will either not list any author at all, or it'll be like, generic staff, or this is by the marketing team. Um, and I just think that. When you do this, you're, you're, you're losing that crucial differentiator in professional services, which is your people, and you're kind of stripping your people and your experts that are doing business of that opportunity to kind of share their involvement in the firm. You know, the, the things that they're proud of talking about day in and day out, the kind of problems that they're solving for their clients. If you, if you, if you strip away their ability to. Have any kind of, you know, uh, authorship, uh, rights on your website, well then, like what kind of a message does that send? First of all, I don't think you're gonna get a lot of people to contribute to your thought leadership program in general. If, if, if you're asking people to write blog posts for, for you, but you're not letting them put their name on it, I bet it's probably pretty hard for you to get You're prob, you know, get anyone to write anything. Right. So, uh, for this example, I, I really like, um, one of our clients, propeller. They do a nice job not just in their blog posts, but in some of their premium resources, even associating that with some of their experts. So for example, right here we have on screen their 2025 People and Change Insights report. And right there at the top of the page. You can see that they list their senior, uh, people and change director Riley Smith, and they give you access to his bio reference to other articles he's written and access to his LinkedIn. They're not hiding Riley, they're putting Riley out there as a visible expert in this, um, you know, whole people and change, uh, part of their business. And, and for me, I think this is definitely the better way to do it. I can't stand when companies try to hide their experts or just have thought leadership content that's produced by the company. For me, that doesn't work.

Joe Pope: 42:11

I mean, if you're talking about the user experience piece there, you pointed to some of those links underneath Riley's name and even LinkedIn, which would actually take you off the website, um, in a different window, of course, but it would still take you off the website. But I. When people are going through this evaluation process, when your prospects are going through this evaluation pro process, and they've already given you the time of day to make it past your homepage, and now they're really starting to dive into the nitty gritty details, giving them that next step in the journey is key. And we talked about it in the form of filtering where they could then filter to look for another similar type project, but in this circumstance, oh wow. I've, I've just read that, that we have a. Awesome piece of premium content. People in Change Insight report for 2025. Well, RI seems to be this real smart fellow. I wonder what else Riley's written, for example. Well, I can just take a one way trip to all the articles written by Riley Smith and Wow, you're scrolling through it. We've got 9, 10, 11 different types of pieces of content that somebody can consume. Next thing you know when this prospect reaches out and they will, right, but when they reach out, they already know Riley. They're even starting to trust Riley. And if we're talking about what's gonna make a difference when you're comparing yourself to, you know, propeller as a consulting firm, we've been talking about some large consulting firms, but if we're trying to set ourselves apart and be memorable, we're creating that opportunity in this set type of setup.

Austin McNair: 43:33

All right guys, we have time each, we, we gotta build out this list of 10 things I hate about Professional services website. We each get one more. All right, one more. So, Joe, what is your last thing to add to our list? I.

Joe Pope: 43:46

I'm a visual guy. Guys. Well, one thing that really stands out to me is visual elements on a website and video is key here, right? And, and I think for the longest time video was unobtainable. It was expensive. It was a challenge. It was the type of thing that, you know, a smaller organization would just shy away from, from the, from the jump. But we just spent an entire in intro, uh, pivotal story in our, one of our more recent podcasts about how you can pretty much create AI video. With the stroke of the keyboard, you got 20 different words in a prompt and you've got a video in front of you. So the excuse now to shy away from video is non-existent. We see it left and right if we're talking about investments that actually make a difference though, a website, a place where you can show. The experience that somebody will have if they work with you. Nothing is gonna do that better than things that just move. Like you, you can get multiple concepts into a ten second reel. Uh, and, and you can show it in a manner that plays within the design nestled there. You could also use it from the perspective of thought leadership content. Hinge is podcast, for example. We're, we're, this is a video podcast. We have a section on our website that is focused on video. Content from this podcast takes you to YouTube and other different ways. So there's a variety of ways that you can bring video into a website experience and have it hit home.

Austin McNair: 45:09

Yeah, absolutely. And I, I think one example, you know, that I, I pulled up here for us is the WSP website. Uh, it's just a good, elegant, attractive way to kind of kick off a user experience when they come to your website. What does it mean to have video, but also use it in a way that's easy to read? Now, I think we could make a slight comment here about, you know, what we. What we meant with like abstract messaging and headlines, you know, they see the world differently, but WSP is, you know, one of the largest. Professional services companies in the world. So I think they can get away with it a little bit, but I just, the, the, the team felt this was a good example of like, leading off with video that captures your attention. Shows kind of like what is, it connects to the messaging, right? Seeing different aspects of the world, seeing different aspects of the world. Um, and for, for us, this was, this was kind of like a great example of using the website experience and featuring a little bit of vi a video in a way that captures attention.

Joe Pope: 46:09

Yeah, I, I think the only reason they can get away with that type of headline is because the video elements behind that headline. And if, if you were just listening to us, just key in wsp.com, show and pivot those images in a manner where you would think about it. Hey, like, think about it in like a, a slideshow, right? Old school projector style with slides, and it's giving that impression of these video elements being stacked on top of each other. That's a different way to think about video. And then as you scroll further down in the Who We Are section, they keep that type of messaging at the front of these different cuts or, uh, small windows of video and take you through that journey of how that messaging actually applies to them, uh, giving you this emotional experience. That is designed not just to be cool to look at, but also teach you something. And in the professional services space, that's key. So like if you're talking about a group that's kind of going from that abstract angle, but nailing it, WSP is one of them.

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 47:09

I think experience, the word you used there, Joe, is, is key. We did a, um, we did some video recently for another client and, um, in their project section of their website, an engineering firm. And, um, I mean they have, they have great photography. But we did a couple, um, examples where we leveraged video partially through like drone and other B-roll on those project pages. And man, does it just bring the whole thing to life. I mean, you feel like you're there. So it is, it's about creating that, that experience from, from the user, from from start to finish.

Austin McNair: 47:40

All right, Mary Blanche, what is the last thing you want to add to our list of the things that you hate about professional services websites?

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 47:49

Okay, so for me, I wanna take us to the careers section of a website. Um, you know, when you are, you know, a potential recruit coming to a website, uh, to look at a company that you're maybe interviewing for, I mean, of course we want you to have any job openings that your company has listed on your career section. That's number one. Right? But that's not the only thing that, that potential recruits care about. Um, you know, a lot of what they ask for, and I, I do a lot of interviews, um, you know, for, for, for Hinge and, and recruiting for our organization and, you know, a lot of things that they wanna know about our, you know, what does mentorship look like? Uh, what is professional development, uh, career advancement look like within your organization? What is your culture like? So, you know, it's always a pretty big missed opportunity when you're not able to articulate those things on something like a website, um, for those potential employees because those are all things that, that they care about and create that fulsome package of what it's like to work for your organization.

Austin McNair: 48:52

Yeah. And MB for the example we chose, this goes back to our superlative episode I, we called out this company Burns and McDonald because they do exactly what you say. They answer a lot of those questions that job seekers have when they come to your website. I. And they're looking Burns McDonald. And McDonald, by the way. Not a hinge client, but this has been an example we've used as kind of, uh, an exam example of a firm that's probably ahead of the game in terms of speaking to those different kind of audiences and listening and, and answering those questions. Lots of use of video, which is excellent. Uh, but they have this section here, find Your Careers that, um, really allows people to explore. Like are you an experienced professional? Are you early in your career? Are you looking for an internship? Military veterans, I mean, they, they personalize this with messaging that cuts to what those people might be looking for at that stage of their career. So, for example, experienced professional, career stability, employee ownership, value added, they want to, you know, are you adding value to the team? You go to early careers. What's the difference? Well, early careers, Career mobility, employee ownership, meaningful projects. So there's a little bit of a difference here in how they're kind of messaging to different generations and people at different parts of their career. And then, like you said, MB like answering some of those questions, like what kind of benefits are there? What does it look like to apply in interview? What does training and development look like? This is a really robust career section. And I mean, just compare this and be to the alternative. Just one single, Hey, this is where you apply for jobs. I mean, what a missed opportunity. If you compare the two things, if you're in a hiring, if you're in a hiring mode right now and you're really trying to grow your team and get the best talent, which of these two options would be the best option for your website?

Mary-Blanche Kraemer: 50:41

Yeah. Hundred percent. And I think when you can, um, curate the content for the type of, uh. Like you were just walking through. I mean, that's like, that's like the 10 of 10. So much of what we see, it's, it's what I said at the, at the start. It's, you know, here are the job openings. If you can even take that one step further in providing additional information. I mean, that's, that's, that's a big jump in the right direction now. This is, this is the 10 of 10, so good choice.

Austin McNair: 51:09

Okay, guys. The last one is in my court. The final thing that we hate about professional services websites, and for me that is, and it's so sad, I get so sad when I see this, right? A professional services website that I. Completely ignores search engine optimization best practices. It's poorly designed for SEO. Oh my gosh, it's so sad, right? Uh, it's just a missed opportunity. And look, guys, we understand that the world of SEO is changing for, for the example, I'm actually gonna use the Hinge website. Uh, H Hinge. We have invested in our own SEO for years and when we kind of run benchmark and diagnostics against a lot of other marketing agencies and a lot of other competitors of ours, we. Totally outperform in terms of benchmarks and the kind of, you know, the kind of traffic that we can garner to our website. Given the, the size of our agency, we go toe to toe with big agencies, um, and our website metrics and our SEO performs way better. Um, and that's because of a lot of, uh, investment over the years in creating great content, keyword driven content, and investing, investing perpetually in an SEO strategy. Now, today, if I had to tell the audience a secret, that doesn't mean that our traffic is just going up and up and up, up into the, up until the right all the time. Actually right now our traffic's going down, which is sad. It's, it, it stinks. But there's a reality at play right now that. Search engines are changing. The way that buyers are searching for, for solutions is, has completely been overhauled, right? And so the, the likelihood of someone clicking through on a, on a search engine result page, that is less likely today than it was in the past. So was this in investment in SEO? Like, was it, was it a waste? Because in 2025 it's not performing the same way? No, absolutely not. Because what we're starting to see now, guys, is that we're getting leads coming in from places like Chat, GPT,

Joe Pope: 53:16

Yeah.

Austin McNair: 53:16

Gemini, perplexity. These sources against our permission, without our permission, crawled our website and stole all of our content. And we are being found now in these, in these large language models when people are searching for solutions. Because for years we have invested in creating high quality content. That is, um. Consistently positioned around what Hinge does. We are a marketing agency for professional services firms, and these models understand that. Google understands that. And so this long investment that we've put into SEO clearly positions us in a way that when people are searching those tools, hinge is dial starting to get found more and more. And this is really, you know what? I want all of our clients to have that experience where even if maybe traffic is going down to maybe some parts of your website, the overall. Position of your company? Whether it's search engine or whether it's large language model, whatever, ro pick your robot. It understands what your company does and what, um, you do it. It is such a necessity and I, it, it, you know, it blows my mind still that there's people out there that say, ah, we, we just don't have time. It's too much work. We're not gonna invest in SEO. We're not gonna invest in creating content that is going to in the long term. Really. Um, I think handicap your, your, your. The experience that your users get, your potential buyers get when they're checking you out

Joe Pope: 54:42

It's quality over quantity. Right. Austin, you talk about some of that declining traffic and yes, we are a marketing agency that will admit that our overall traffic was going down. But I will tell you when we look at that traffic that's going down, it's not really in the audiences that I. We necessarily care about, right? And we can see those types of things through Google Analytics and other different ways. And our conversions, especially in our middle funnel traffic, it's still leading to conversations. In fact, it's more qualified conversations than we've ever had, and that is because of that commitment to SEO. So while we can't control the mothership, Google, we can play in a manner and we can. Develop content in a manner we can optimize websites in a manner that are gonna give us our best chance to be successful. And, and at the end of the day, we, we've seen in research what it is that makes you successful. And it is that thought provoking, insightful information that you put into your insight sessions, your, your services pages, your industry, and so forth, so on and so forth.

Austin McNair: 55:40

All right guys, so let's recap the list. The 10 things that we Hate about professional services websites. We had huge navigation menus, bad homepage headlines in uninspired art direction, no filtering tools, inadequate case stories, a lack of expert bio pages. Not attributing experts to thought leadership content. No video content,, no. Uh, interesting career section mb the one that you called out. And then finally, poor op, poorly optimized websites for SEO. That is the 10 things that we hate about professional services websites. We hope that everyone listening to this. Your website doesn't go against the grain of these things that we don't like. And if they do, you can, you can fix them. That's, that's the great thing about, about marketing. All this stuff can be redone. All this stuff we can iterate and get better

Joe Pope: 56:34

We can help you fix.

Austin McNair: 56:36

we can help you fix'em. Um. Joe, you know this, this idea of doing this list was inspired by the 10 Things I Hate About You Movie, which has this iconic scene from the character Kat who delivers this raw emotional poem in front of her class so she reads that poem. Joe, and I really wanted to ask you, I wanted to challenge you. Could you recite for us a poem about the 10 things that you hate about professional services websites?

Joe Pope: 57:05

I have not actually read this through, I'm just reading it for the first time. We're gonna try to capture my thespian days at, uh, in high school and we'll, uh, we'll give it a shot. We will, we'll do our best'cause these are the 10 things we hate about your website. I hate the way you start no clear idea in sight. Your homepage headlines dimming all the light. I hate your art direction. So bland and so plain and navigation menus causing endless pain. I hate no filters there. On content fast and wide and meager case studies where impact loves to hide. I hate the expert bios, so brief. So revealing no names on thought leadership, no human feeling. I hate your lack of video. A missed and silent plea and career pages blank for all the world to see, but mostly I hate the way. I don't hate you. SEO though they claim you're dead. It doesn't show. Not even close. Not even a little bit, not even at all.

Austin McNair: 58:12

Wow. Unbelievable. Unbelievable stuff.

Joe Pope: 58:18

Thank you. Thank you.

Austin McNair: 58:21

see if you listen to this podcast and you make it all the way to the end, there are some great treats that we put for you here at the end of these episodes, and we hope that you've enjoyed another episode of Spiraling Up. Uh, if you're here, hit the like button, subscribe. Leave us a comment, let us know what's the one thing that you hate about professional services websites. What did we miss? What did we cover In today's episode, and on behalf of MB Joe, myself. This has been another episode of Spiraling Up. We'll see you on the next one. Thank you so much.