[D856C]

I like the visual flow of 2. However, the nondescript layout is going to provide a good background for any examples that appear on the page (the content).

Business people don't want 1) The layout to scream "look at me" like a sugared up 4-year-old while their potential customers are trying to read what's in the layout. 2) Sites that sell more copies of PhotoShop and Flash than the product they are hiring you to help them sell.

To that end, the layout isn't important. Content is. That means establishing a unique selling proposition that differentiates you from an army of competitors who invariably try to blow your mind or go corporate "me-too" zombie.

First off "before" and "after." It doesn't do any good to show the after without the before. Show an improvement.

Focus on something more than the layout. I have rarely seen a site that put in good looking graphics that had the slightest relevance to the business. Good looking stock photography cliches of fashion models pretending to be business people notwithstanding.

That means product photos, employee photos, branding, infographics, charts and diagrams and other content. Make the product look good. Demonstrate you can take a photograph of an actual employee -- and use that for branding against the plastic me-too superficial status quo. Show the corporate value chain. Don't just shoehorn a stock photograph of a fictional glass-clad corporate headquarters into a header.

Far too often graphic design firms who call what they do 'Branding' or 'Business Identity' are really creating business camouflage. There is Coke and Pepsi, and fifty million generic wannabe cola websites. Hardly anyone understands the position of the 7UP / UnCola part of branding -- positioning against competition. Blind imitation is not competition.