The web world was supposed to get better and better every day, and yet we’re more than 25 years in since the advent of the first website, and still, we commit mistakes while designing them. By now you would expect people to know what works, and what doesn’t when it comes to designing a website, but unfortunately, that’s not the case. Some worst design mistakes are being committed over and over again, which ultimately drive off potential customers and also frustrate the existing ones.
So whether you are a large company or a start-up, don’t you think it’s an excellent idea if you are aware of these pitfalls beforehand and be ready to give your competitors a blow? Don’t you think you should know the designing mistakes that other websites did in the first place?
Earlier, we have had for you simple yet effective tips to get higher website conversions, why must every website have backlinks, swift tactics that can get your website rank higher in Google, etc., etc.
But today, using our expertise of more than a decade, we have for you 9 of some worst website designing mistakes, that should be avoided at any cost.
1. A non-Customizable Template
Whether you hire a freelancer, or you ask your team of in-house designers to do it, you give them a good freedom to come up with creative designs based on their wisdom and insight. But be sure enough that they select an entirely customizable template. Because if you get no provision to amend or tweak the website design in the future, based on your brand’s demands, then it is a sheer wastage of money.
Every marketer needs a customizable template that could be tweaked as per their needs. But non-customizable templates restricts that scope and hamper the creative requirements of the brand. So it will be a big time blunder if you are left with a template that you cannot amend.
There are plenty of free website templates available online, and freelancers tend to pick one of those, to make a profit. But can you take that risk for your brand? Guess not. So it is always recommended while creating a business website, to choose a professional website design agency who will create fully customized templates and also give you source files so that you can make amends later.
2. Too many Images spoil the Site
Keep images to a minimum of 2-3.
More than that will make your website slow and take more time to load, thereby frustrating your visitors and making them abandon your site. A research done by Amazon found out that a mere 0.1-second increase in site speed and page loading speed leads to a 1% growth in e-commerce sales. So think, if you can increase your sales doing nothing but just sticking to a minimum number of images, isn’t that great?
3. Flawed Encoding
Though a wrong encoding is almost impossible in this age, still sometimes mistakes happen. But more than a mistake, it is a show of sheer laziness and sloppy work. You must always check if you content is displaying correctly or not before making it live on the web, and ensure that you use proper encoding (UTF-8 or UTF-16). Your website is your recognition, that is what creates an impression about you on a visitor’s mind. A petty issue of a single apostrophe can mar your impression, especially if it happens in the headlines. So be careful of using proper encoding.
4. Multiple Texts and Visuals
A balance between fonts and visuals is very crucial to make a website perfect. Otherwise, too many fonts and big visuals can overwhelm visitors. Striking a balance between texts and visuals is imperative. Though some people may prefer visuals more than texts, and some might vice versa, but creating a perfect parity between the two delivers an aesthetically pleasing website.
5. Bad Color choices
Don’t go for gaudy, loud colors. Your designer can certainly play with his/her creativity while designing the website, but that creativity must know its bounds when it comes to the choice of color. If there are too many colors going on, this may fend your visitors off. So it’s better to stick to two or three contrasting colors making your texts readable. And at the same time gives your website a smart, professional and corporate look.
6. Unwanted Background Music
A surprising music coming from their speaker, with no source identified, is the last thing that a visitor wants from a website. Not only it distracts and creates a diversion, but also it is not a cool feature to add to your website. Put that effort in beautifying some other aspect of the website.
7. Complicated Website Navigation
If you ask five people what they want from a website, four of them will say they want a simple and easy navigation. Smart navigation functionality is vital for any website design, and the key to it is not encouraging too many links and click-to-open features on every button. If the navigation bar is poorly arranged, too illegible, or too huge, it can confuse a visitor. A quick way to solve this is to have a search bar on the website.
8. Social Share buttons clutter
There are numerous social media platforms, including the most popular, the moderate popular, and the less popular ones. And you may have a profile in all of them. But there is simply no need to clutter your website with 20 different social media buttons, when visitors recognize only the most popular ones, such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, Pinterest, etc.
Too many social media buttons would not only make your website slow but also overwhelm and confuse your visitors. Remember always, less is more!
9. Annoying Pop-ups and Overlays
The ‘overlays’ or the pop-up ads are indeed annoying and distracting. The transparent pop-up overlays that several websites use, block the underlying content, make you wait for an ad to play, and then get you to the actual content. Some websites even go to the extent of positioning the close button in such a way that it is hard to find and a visitor has to wait for the ad to be played till the end.
Think from a visitor’s perspective. Don’t make the mistake of having these pop-ups in your website or else you will lose prospects. Also, there remains a chance of your website getting severely penalized by Google, as per the search engine giant’s latest algorithm update on January 10, which strictly restricts websites from using pop-ups and interstitials.
So why take a chance for your brand?
So, in short, if your website design has any of these flaws mentioned above, it’s time that you take actions against it. Because though apparently, these seem to be petty issues, these flaws have enough adverse effect on your visitors and drive them away from your site.
You can feel free and get in touch with us if you need to create a brand new website for your business, or if you want a revamp of your existing website. Also please share your comments and thoughts in the comments section below.
