It’s Friday afternoon and love is in the air – a love of all things simple that is! I obviously include myself when talking of simple things…

It’s the acronym that has been around for years and I was reminded of it when browsing the web earlier. I am of course talking about the KISS principle – Keep It Simple Stupid. It is the perfect moto for any business, why confuse your customers with too much information when all they really want to know is the facts.

The internet is no exception to the rule and the most successful sites, i.e. the ones that get the most traffic are the simple ones. Google is the shining example which we can’t fail to mention, with a site that is so simple it does exactly what it says on the tin and I’d challenge anybody to struggle using it.

Yell.com is another internet example who had originally got it wrong although nobody realised until they changed it.

This is how it used to look.

old-yell.gif

This is how it looks now.

new_yell.jpg
Traffic to their site has rocketed since.

Sometimes though choice, which is usually a good thing can have an adverse effect on the KISS principle. Take for example walking into Starbucks and asking for a regular coffee, something I did once when I was in New York. This created all kinds of confusion and they ended up giving me a white americano as the closest thing they could find. Who would walk into a gourmet coffee house and ask for a regular coffee!? Well I did.

So remember the KISS principle when coming up with that new product, that new design, that new training piece. Taking a step back can sometimes mean taking 2 steps forward.