Recently I emailed a business owner in response to questions he had about how to improve his site. I didn't even focus on its appearance, which was pretty standard-looking for a corporate site. Instead, I pointed out simple tweaks that could improve its performance. I said that sometimes ugly sites, implementing certain features, will get a better response than slick and beautiful ones. He emailed me back, praising me for my "honesty" and asking if his site was ugly. That wasn't what I meant! Whoops. I was just trying to drive home the concept that sometimes features are more important than beauty for achieving results. This is the kind of thing I try to avoid since it might have been his favorite niece, his wife, or someone close, who designed it and I am not into trashing people's creative efforts especially in businesses in which they have more expertise than I do (fashion in this case, about which I know squat). Now, how to deal with this delicate situation...