What if a Website was Built like a Beaver Dam?
Have you ever watched a beaver build a dam before? It gathers up sticks, dirt, rocks, and anything else it can find and tosses it into a river to make a glorious mess.
Does it seem a bit random to you? How could a busy animal relate to building websites?
Well, there are many advantages of building a beaver dam that can be applied to creating websites. Such as a strong foundation, every branch has it's place, water flows smoothly, it can take pressure, and even requiring maintenance.
Let's compare what these little furry creatures do to the websites we build each day.
1. Every Website Needs a Strong Foundation
When building a beaver dam, the beaver will find a nice spot along their pathway and begin to toss in branches to block off the river.
Building a website is very similar.
Before diving into colors and fonts, a strong foundation is needed when building a website.
This can include having a set structure, reliable hosting, organized code, mobile friendly designs, and even easy navigation for the visitors.
What good would it do to have a lovely website if it did not have a good foundation to begin with?
Like a beaver blocking off a river, a strong foundation to a website will help take pressure off of other parts and set it up for success.
Just avoid tossing in random branches.
2. Every Branch has it's Place
Every stick, branch, rope, or rock has it's place in a beaver dam.
They each play a role when considering the whole structure.
Building a website is very similar in that each part plays a role in the overall look and feel of the website.
HTML, CSS, and JS all have their purpose.
Even as a website gets more complex, the role of each part still matters.
They may not all be the spotlight, but together they make up the website experience.
Say you're building a restaurant website. You will have your homepage, menu, gallery, and contact information all as separate pages, but when put together, it's all one restaurant website experience.
If you were to miss out on your contact information or your menu options, then that's not a complete restaurant website anymore.
This is the same with building any great website.
Focus more on what you need, rather than what you want.
3. Water Flow
The water flow is different in a river with a beaver dam compared to without.
The water flows around the beaver dam because it has nowhere else to go.
Websites are the same way in that the flow of visitors must be directed to certain pages.
Where would you want to take your visitor first?
A service page, past projects, or maybe even your contact information page?
A great way to direct your visitors is by creating a simple, but effective menu.
Using internal linking and easy to read content will also help direct your visitors.
This is why call to action buttons are great on websites. They help direct your visitor to where you'd like them to go next.
As your visitors become more interested in your website, it would be a shame to loose them along the way.
If your visitors become confused or lost, that's like having a hole in your beaver dam.
Water would just flow out the hole and not into your beaver pond.
4. Take Pressure
A beaver dam must be able to withstand the pressure of the water flowing into it.
Websites must be able to withstand the pressure of hundreds of visitors at the same time.
Sometimes an image takes too long to load or a certain plugin breaks.
This could ruin an otherwise great website experience for your visitors.
There are ways to make sure that your website experience won't fall apart.
This includes taking care of images, having great code, great hosting, great security, great backups - the website reliability checklist.
A website doesn't have to be complicated to be taken care of, it only has to be maintained.
In the end, a great code and well built website can withstand almost any pressure that is thrown at it.
5. Maintenance is Key
One thing I find interesting about beavers is that they will not always stay with their dam.
Sometimes they come back to reinforce it.
Website owners should do the same.
Launching your website is only the beginning.
As your business grows, so will your website needs.
You may add new services, change up your prices, release new content, and change your contact information.
Not to mention that browser technology constantly changes and updates.
Your website will need regular maintenance to make sure everything works smoothly.
That could include everything from fixing bugs to changing up the website layout.
A simple maintenance plan for your website will save you headaches in the future.
6. Build Something that Creates Value
Beaver dams do not only help out the beaver family.
The beaver pond can also be a home for many animals and creatures.
When building a business or a website, not every animal (or business) needs one.
It should create value for the people that are using it.
For some small businesses, a website can be their gateway to the world.
For some online stores, it can help them advertise their products and services.
For some professional websites, it can show off their skills and experience.
Every detail matters when building a website that not only creates value, but shows what you stand for.
A flashy animation is great, can you convey your services to the public?
A sleek website is great, can you make it easy for the public to contact you?
That's what it means to invest in a great website.
Final Thoughts - Think Like a Beaver, Build like a Developer
A beaver will not spend a fortune on the tools they use to build their dams. They will use what they have access to and they will do it smartly.
Web developers can learn a thing or two from these furry animals when it comes to building websites.
Start with a strong foundation, make sure every part has a role, let the water flow, take the pressure, and keep it maintained.
Most importantly, your website is not successful, unless it helps real people.
At Arish IT Services, we believe that websites should not only look great, but be great as well.
Whether it be a small business looking to advertise or an enterprise level multi tenant application, we create great experiences for everyone who visits. Afterall, if a beaver can build a great dam with only sticks and rocks, we should be able to build a great website for your business.