Website Mistakes You’re Probably Making & Can Fix Quickly

Really bad website mistakes can even be hidden in really nice looking websites, chances are you’re making most of these mistakes and you can identify and fix them now.

Website Mistakes You're Probably Making & Can Fix Quickly

You’re here because you’re looking for ways to improve your website, right?

So, I’m guessing that there are some website mistakes that are keeping your site from:

• generating the traffic you want
• engaging visitors to keep them active
• generating the leads or sales you desire

Chances are that you’re having a hard time identifying what these issues are, because your site looks fantastic, right?

This is a common problem. Partly because website design, website themes, and platforms to create great looking sites are so readily available. There’s nothing wrong with that, but what that has done is made it so that having a nice looking site simply isn’t enough.

For many businesses a website is expected to be a (if not THE) primary source of revenue generation, and this simply can’t happen when website mistakes that leave the user out of the equation are happening.

People forget that if the website is not user-friendly, visitors will bounce.

As you reassess your website for these common mistakes, consider how it will funnel sales and how you want it to accomplish that. Don’t lose sight of the fact that the primary purpose and ultimate goal is to attract visitors to take action.

Let’s take a look at the website mistakes most businesses are making and how to correct them.

Website Mistake #1 – Poor or No Responsiveness

Although everyone in the online field knows the significance of having a responsive website design, many business owners don’t know to prioritize it.

Responsive design increases the accessibility of your website across devices, such as smartphones, desktops, tablets, iPad, etc.

Even Google judges it as a critical factor in determining the performance and quality of the platform. There are three configurations one can consider using to be mobile friendly.

  • Building a website and mobile site separately
  • Sites opening with the same URLs, but their HTML and CSS may vary depending on the type of device a user is using
  • Websites open across all the devices with the same set of URLs and HTML but with different CSS styles to display page correctly. CSS media queries is a technique that helps deliver a page as per the device.

When determining what is best for your business, keep in mind what Google says in their developer Guide:

We recommend using responsive web design because it:

  • Makes it easier for users to share and link to your content with a single URL.
  • Helps Google’s algorithms accurately assign indexing properties to the page rather than needing to signal the existence of corresponding desktop/mobile pages.
  • Requires less engineering time to maintain multiple pages for the same content.
  • Reduces the possibility of the common mistakes that affect mobile sites.
  • Requires no redirection for users to have a device-optimized view, which reduces load time. Also, user agent-based redirection is error-prone and can degrade your site’s user experience (see Pitfalls when detecting user agents for details).
  • Saves resources when Googlebot crawls your site. For responsive web design pages, a single Googlebot user agent only needs to crawl your page once, rather than crawling multiple times with different Googlebot user agents to retrieve all versions of the content. This improvement in crawling efficiency can indirectly help Google index more of your site’s content and keep it appropriately fresh.

Website Mistake #2 – Hard to Scan Content

what makes a successful landing page

On average, a visitor can read only 28% of content on a website. Hence, it’s critical to make it easy to browse for them.

You don’t have to cut down your information. Instead, focus on its proper presentation through sub-heads, short paragraphs, highlighted formatting, bullets & numbers, etc. This kind of approach can help you increase the consumption rate of your content among people.

Check out this tutorial on how to format your website content the right way.

 

Website Mistake #3 – Poor Graphics and Photos

Most businesses need to resort to the use of stock photos to convey the essence of their content to their readers. Photos are great because they serve as visual clues for the reader to help understand the points being made.

But using generic stock photos can be damaging as they can obscure the message.

It’s always better to have original images. If budget, time, or resource is a challenge, you can always use stock photos, just make sure to be prudent with them. The photos that you select should either answer your visitor’s questions through a story or teach and show. The images have to fulfill one of these two rules. Otherwise, you could just be wasting your efforts, time, and space.

In this context, it is also necessary to note that images and graphics have to be responsive. Their shapes and sizes should be able to modify according to the screen size.

Website Mistake #4 – Unclear Navigation Menu

Navigation menu and breadcrumb trail are two essential things that help users to explore your platform without any confusion. However, if the navigation menu is not visible or distinct from other visual elements, users can get lost on your website.

We’ve all been on one of those websites where you get lost chasing a piece of content never to find your way back to any sort of organized category.

Ultimately, you end up just exiting. But if the navigational components are precise, visitors can focus on your platform and spend some time there.

Some companies get extra experimental with their ideas and introduce moving, bouncing, rolling or other such animated navigation designs. But beware of these creative mistakes. Users can accidentally click them and move out of the page from which you could drive a conversion. You don’t want these kind of mistakes on your website.

Website Mistake #5 – Carousels on homepage

I’m one of those designers who has mixed feelings about home page carousels, because the real estate is so valuable. That being said they can still create issues with the user.

The fact is that only 1% of site visitors actually click on a slide, and it’s almost always the first slide.

People can also easily mistake them as ads and avoid them all together. If any of these two things happen ultimately you’re killing the effectiveness of your home page. Important content gets pushed down and more importantly missed. Your website visitors can feel distracted or annoyed for not being able to see what they wanted to see. Consequently, they may not convert.

Aside from that image carousels play a big part in slow loading, clumsy fonts, 404 error, missing favicons, and absence of necessary design elements. If you’re looking for more scientific proof that sliders damage user experience and work against your goals, you’ll want to take a look at this article by Yoast.

Techniques to Improve Website Design Mistakes

  • Extensive planning: Cover your buyer’s journey in your website design with proper planning – where they go first, what they read, what converts them, etc.
  • Social share and follow buttons: These non-pushy tools help your visitors to share your content on their social media accounts quickly. You can use them as a good source of traffic generator.
  • Calls-to-action: Include call-to-action buttons at the right places to guide your users on the next step.
  • Images: Choose website photos smartly. These should look genuine and apt for your theme.
  • Navigation: Content layout, responsive design, and navigation bars are essential for increasing the user experience on your website.
  • Expansive homepage: You can make your home page longer with a suitable value proposition, intro video, products & services, etc.
  • White space: It makes your website readable by utilizing the design elements in the best possible way.
  • SEO: Weave SEO techniques from the development stage of the website for excellent optimization and results.
  • Testing: Use A/B tests, heat maps, or multi-variant tests to find out which element is working with users and which is not. It can make your updating and upgrading job easy.

For any business, creating a successful website can mean a lot of work. But if you don’t want to miss out on leads and conversions, identifying and correcting these common website mistakes will make a huge impact. If you need help, then choose a reputable web design company for assistance.

After all, your website should be a solution and not just a place holder for ineffective content.