The trouble with being a website owner is that you sometimes grow too attached to your website’s design. It gets to the point where you fall in love with your design and have a complete inability to see its flaws. When a site visitor gets annoyed at the design he encounters, he will leave as soon as possible and explore another website. He has this option because there are a few hundred million sites that currently exist! In order to prevent visitors leaving within seconds of arriving, it’s important to take an objective look at your website design. Below is a list of website designs that should not be included in your final masterpiece. If your site contains one or more of the following, you need to be brave and get rid it.
Background Music
It doesn’t matter how much you love ‘Enter Sandman’ by Metallica, not everyone is going to feel the same way. While entering a website only to be bombarded with music blasting in your ears was fun and novel about 10 years ago, it is considered annoying by the modern generation. The music detracts from your website and if a visitor really dislikes it, say goodbye to a potential customer.
Flash
Using Flash design isn’t good for a variety of reasons. It is even bad news from an SEO standpoint, as search engine crawlers do not like Flash. In addition, sites laden with Flash content take ages to load. For the vast majority of people, waiting several seconds for a page to load is infuriating and may cause them to leave your site. The average attention span of an Internet user is short enough as it is; don’t cut into their time by forcing them to wait for your site filled with flashy graphics. Worst of all, if your website visitor is using an iPad or an iPhone, your site won't even load on their device.
Dark Backgrounds
What is wrong with a nice light-colored background with easy to read text? Some webmasters think that having a black background with white text is cool and edgy. It isn’t; it’s very annoying and hard to read. Websites with black backgrounds don’t do well when it comes to converting leads into sales. And if something doesn’t help your bottom line, what do you do? You axe it, and fast.
Small Text
While it’s true that visitors can alter the size of font to suit their needs, why make them work? You should know the golden rule of the Internet: Never force visitors to do something they don’t need to. Having to alter the type is irritating, so stick with tried and trusted font sizes. You can be sure that your default font is about two sizes too small, so bump it up a bit.
Pop-Up Advertisements
This is possibly the single most irritating thing encountered by most web surfers. Proponents of pop-up ads will tell you that they help boost click-through rates. This is strange, since the majority of people we speak to on a regular basis absolutely hate pop-up ads and such advertising makes them want to leave the site immediately. When you use pop-up ads, you are basically telling the user that you don’t care too much about their website experience and just want to make a sale.
Hidden (Or Missing) Contact Information
Believe it or not, there are online businesses that have a fancy website laden with bells and whistles but are missing one vital ingredient: their contact information! Yes, there are companies that neglect to put details on how to contact them on their site. Just how do you expect people to get in touch? Some businesses unknowingly make it difficult for their contact info to be found. Just create a simple "Contact Us" page that is nice and easy to read. It isn’t that difficult and improves user experience immensely.
Incoherent Information
If you want your website to be a success, clarity is essential. You need to tell the user what they need, why the need it, how to get it, and how much it will cost them. All of this information should be out in the open. Your website is a means of gaining customers, not a magical mystery tour. Remember, you don’t have a great deal of time to make an impression, so use those valuable few seconds wisely.
No Social Buttons
Every company worth its salt will have social media pages on Facebook and Twitter at the very least. There needs to be social buttons that take a visitor to your Facebook/Twitter page in a single click. A business lacking social media buttons gives off the impression that it is not a serious player in its industry. This may seem harsh but it is undeniably true.
When it comes to website design, it is all about what the consumer wants, NOT what you want. The whole purpose of creating a website is to attract traffic which eventually transforms into paying customers. To achieve this, you need to identify the problem your target audience has and offer a solution. This means creating compelling content to make them reach into their collective wallets, but it also means developing website design that is appealing. Ultimately, the objective is to offer a positive user experience, and if you are making the mistakes outlined above, you are bound to fail in this mission.
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