Nature.com had an interesting article earlier this year about research conducted by Gitte Lindgaard of Carleton University that investigates how web users judge websites. A few thought-provoking nuggets from the article are:

• If you can snare people with an attractive design, they are more likely to overlook other minor faults with the site, and may actually rate its actual content more favorably.
• People enjoy being right, so continuing to use a website that gave a good first impression helps to ‘prove’ to themselves that they made a good initial decision.
• Potential readers can make snap decisions in just 50 milliseconds.

Remember that your church website’s quality of design will influence its effectiveness. This is true regarding any design. People’s behavior is greatly influenced by their environment. This principle applies to the brick and mortar church as well as the virtual church.