guff

50 ways to leave your web (2.0) site

I’m never quite sure why I bother with it, but Wired’s Monkey Bites pointed me to a sort of “Web 2.0″ bulletin poster put up by Meetup co-founder Scott Heiferman, and what the hell I might as well note it here. It’s called 50 Reasons Why More People Aren’t Using Your Website. And if that’s not enough to get you over there in a hurry and start taking notes, read on.

Some of Scott’s points are pretty straightforward, while others are merely obvious attempts at wit. But it’s stuff like reason 33. “Because they’re shy” that makes it sound like he’s talking about invites to a party rather than the next Internet clique site. Meanwhile, reason 16. “Because it sounds like a citibank ad and they hate citibank ads” is just the sort of thing that leads to 10. “Because it doesn’t make them smile.” And you know I hate that.

The problem with lists like this excuding (one of) the true path(s) to online success is they make me want to go out and create something which represents the exact opposite of each and every step, then make a fortune off it proving them wrong. (Oh sure, call it spite. I do.) Why so? Because if there’s one thing I’ve learned during my time online, it’s you can go broke several times over by overestimating your audience.

There’s catering, and then there’s pandering. But in the end, there’s my absolute certainty there’s always just enough someones somewhere out there looking for what you’re offering to make it worth your while, as long as you don’t put too much into it. And it doesn’t really matter what it is. I’m not sure you can take that to the bank, but it should be enough to pay off any run of the mill Web 2.0 guru.

Does any of this make sense? God I hope not.