Your business’s website will be one of the first ways many potential customers learn about your company. People look up businesses online now more than ever, and first impressions are everything. Any issues with your business’s site could drive customers away and cost you money. On the other hand, if your business has a great site, it makes customers more likely to shop with you and remember your brand. Here are four of the most common problems with business sites that can send potential customers away.
It’s too Slow
When people are browsing the web, they don’t want to be kept waiting for a slow-loading site. People have plenty of options, and they’re not going to stick around if your site hasn’t loaded within the first few seconds. One useful option for checking if your business site is fast enough is the Google Developer PageSpeed Insights tool. It’s available free of charge, and all you need to do is punch in your site’s URL. The tool then gives it a speed rating from zero to 100, with anything above 75 being good. It also includes areas that are slowing your site down and instructions on how to fix them.
It Has Unprofessional Design
It’s natural to focus on the products your business offers, but design is almost as important. Even if your business has an amazing product, people won’t bother learning about it if your site looks unprofessional. It can be expensive to build a professional site, but you should consider it an investment in your business. When a visitor reaches your site, the first thing they’ll judge it on is how it looks to them. If it has a generic logo and design, it shows that there hasn’t been much attention to detail on the site, which leads to visitors not taking your business seriously.
It’s Difficult to Navigate
This can be tricky, because you may inherently understand how to navigate your business site, even if a web developer builds it for you. Your visitors do not, and if they don’t know how to find what they’re looking for, they’re just going to leave. It’s a good idea to hire people to test your site’s usability. Another way to make your site easier to navigate is by improving your database so that data is more available and searchable. Companies exist that can provide maintenance and hosting of your database as a service. When you add a simple search function, it can be a huge help for visitors.
It’s Not Optimized for Mobile Devices
In the past, you could get away with setting up a site for computer users and calling it a day. That doesn’t work anymore, because people browse on their smartphones and tablets about as much as they do on their computers. If your site is only responsive on computers, you’re missing out on a huge number of potential customers. One way to ensure that your site works on mobile devices, too, is the Google PageSpeed Insights tool mentioned earlier, as it also provides a speed rating for your site when visited on mobile devices. Remember also that the mobile version of your site doesn’t need to be a scaled-down version of the computer version. You can make a mobile version that’s entirely its own if that leads to a better site.
When you have a high-quality site for your business, it can often be instrumental in converting your visitors into paying customers. By avoiding some of the most common business site mistakes, you can build a better site that all your visitors will appreciate.