Does the website design matter?
pedalpete: I think the term 'design' can be misleading as it has a few connotations. 
If you think craigslist or drudge report, you can say design doesn't matter because, they are ugly sites. 
But there are lots of sights that have nice colors and images but aren't usable.I couldn't find a link to your site, so I can't figure out where you fit in.For design, go usable first, then dress it up. like building a house, foundation, make sure the door is in the right place, you've got a nice driveway, etc. Get a site people can look at. Then add the layers of 'design'.Take a look at apple.com (the mac page is probably better than the home page for a comparison http://apple.com/mac). As usual via their minimalism, there is a ton of design, but you almost want to click on stuff. Compare it to linux.com, less enticing, then try microsoft.com.I personally fall victim to overloading people with content, and not giving enough direction. Less is often more.