What the channel could learn from WordPress founder Mike Little

Nick Booth advises the WordPress founder that the best thing is to keep it simple and don’t bamboozle people with too many options.

IN THE CURRENT ISSUE:

The problem with software developers like Mike Little is that they know too much. He is a master of many programming languages and disciplines, and he set up the Number 10 Downing Street site for the Cabinet Office. You might think that people with encyclopedic expertise on everything are wonderful, but to be honest, they have the capacity to really get on everyone’s wick. It’s nothing personal. In fact, it’s admirable that anyone can accumulate complete mastery of any subject. The danger is that people who know too much can never give you a straight answer. Ask them what the time is, and they’ll respond with: “Well, it all depends on what you want. It depends on what region you’re in and what system of measurement is being used.

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And so on. And on. I give up as soon as they use the phrase, “it’s horses for courses, really.

Little, co-founder of website building software WordPress, has managed to get 26 percent of the world’s website owners to use his software. That’s an incredible achievement, given the complexity of options the system offers and the cluelessness of the potential customers. So how did he solve the conundrum of simplifying his system without underselling it?

What lessons can the channel learn from the WordPress philosophy?

Don’t give clients options; give them decisions, says Little. “Every time you give a user an option, you are asking them to make a decision. When a user doesn’t care or understand the option, this ultimately leads to frustration,” he adds. Service providers might assume that everything is a good thing, but these choices end up being technical ones that the average end-user has no interest in. “It’s our duty as developers to make smart design decisions and avoid putting the weight of technical choices on our end users,” says Little.

Hardcore webaholic. Unapologetic pop culture enthusiast. Music evangelist. Avid alcohol lover. Social media trailblazer.
Spoke at an international conference about implementing dolls in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Spent 2002-2007 working with human growth hormone in Pensacola, FL. Spent college summers exporting foreign currency on Wall Street. Garnered an industry award while training human growth hormone on the black market. Spent 2002-2007 promoting fatback in Libya. Spent 2001-2007 implementing jack-in-the-boxes in Libya.

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