There are more than 1.8 billion websites live today – and the count is going up every second.
If you want your business to stand out in that huge number, you need to focus on having great website design, and producing great content.
Get the users returning time after time by avoiding these common website mistakes.
1. Trying to Cram Everything in At Once
The human brain can only take in and analyze about 3 or 4 ‘bits’ of information at once.
If you want your users to process what you’re saying to them, it’s no good having 20 different options on one page. Presenting too many choices at once overloads them with information, and they might give up and find a different site.
It’s better to present a small range of choices that represent the user funnel(s) you’re trying to make them enter.
2. The Site is Too Slow
As speeds continue to improve, Internet users are fast becoming used to pages loading in seconds or less.
If your site doesn’t load quickly, they’re not going to wait around.
Optimizing load times is perhaps the most important aspect of web design. Even if your site is ground-breaking, nobody will have the patience to wait for even ten seconds. So your great site is redundant!
3. Forgetting About Mobile
Adaptive/responsive website design techniques are used to make websites useable for mobile users.
If your site isn’t mobile-optimized, it’s going to be punished by search engines.
It will also be punished by users, who may remember that your site isn’t mobile-friendly and simply not bother next time.
4. Users Can’t Find What They Need
Let’s say you sell speedboats. Your users come to your website looking for information about speedboats and details of the speedboats for sale today. They want to research, and they want to purchase.
They don’t want to read about your speedboat holiday from a few years back, though that could make a good blog post.
The point isn’t that they’re not interested in anything else. You need to prioritize the right information to increase their ability to research and convert.
5. There Aren’t Any Headers
How are people going to find their way around if they aren’t given any direction?
As well as thinking about how the pages connect with each other, you need to use clear H1, H2 and H3 headers.
These help to set out information in a logical order and help people scan for the relevant information they need. This is vital, as people don’t tend to take the time to fully absorb a website.
Headers act as flags for their attention, running them through what’s on the page without the need to read it all.
Learn More About Great Website Design
Now you know about these very common mistakes, you’re ready to start building.
For more advice on how to create great digital content, read our other blog posts. Or talk to us to see how optimizing your site could turn it into your business’ strongest asset.
We look forward to getting you up to speed.
