No matter how elaborate the design, including color and graphics, it should let the message do its work. Design should support the message and the site, not dominate them. Here, artfulness counts. Complex graphics may look great, but may take so long to load that viewers quickly move on to other sites. You may have the most attractive site on the internet, but if there's no reason for people to revisit your site frequently, your objectives for it will rarely be achieved.
Repetition is impact, as every marketing professional knows.
The competition for attention to any one site is overwhelming. Think of the difference between sitting straight in a chair in front of a computer screen, and relaxing in an easy chair, reading a brochure. If you want your viewer to get your message onscreen, it has to be easily readable, and worth reading. If you can't sustain interest in large blocks of text, with a message that's interesting and important, then stick to short messages. Everybody knows how to read printed text, but not everybody is computer literate.