Reading Spartaneity drew my attention back to Stanford’sWeb Credibility Project where you can read detailed explanations of and research behind these guidelines:
- Make it easy to verify the accuracy of the information on your site.
- Show that there’s a real organization behind your site. Showing that your web site is for a legitimate organization will boost the site’s credibility.
- Highlight the expertise in your organization and in the content and services you provide.
- Show that honest and trustworthy people stand behind your site.
- Make it easy to contact you.
- Design your site so it looks professional (or is appropriate for your purpose).
- Make your site easy to use — and useful.
- Update your site’s content often (at least show it’s been reviewed recently).
- Use restraint with any promotional content (e.g., ads, offers).
- Avoid errors of all types, no matter how small they seem.
Most of these seem to boil down to (a) showing the human beings behind the site, and (b) taking your site seriously and demonstrating your commitment to its quality.