Your business can’t succeed without a great website. But what if you’ve invested time, money and a lot of energy into creating your website but it’s not working as well as you had hoped? Simple website design mistakes could be costing you customers.
In 2020, functional and attractive web design can be the difference between a website that piques your customers’ interests and one that wastes their time. There are things that all decent websites possess and other things that can help your business stand apart from the crowd.
Today, we’re going to talk about some of the things that you should avoid doing in web design. Bad websites make your business look unprofessional, reduce conversions and prevent you from appealing to new customers or satisfying your current ones.
It doesn’t have to be difficult to build a website that your visitors will love, so avoid these mistakes and you’ll be on the right path.
1. Not Mobile Friendly
In the last few years, the tides have shifted when it comes to search. If your website isn’t optimised for mobile, you’re going to annoy most of your visitors. The majority of people are using a smartphone or tablet to conduct searches so this is where they’re going to be visiting from. If your website is not mobile-friendly your SEO will take a huge hit too.
Ensure that your site is functional by testing it regularly with Google Search Console.
2. It’s not Obvious What you do and Why Clients Should Choose YOU
I see a lot of business websites that look decent, function well on mobile, and run quickly, but aren’t clear about what it is that they do and who they serve. As a business owner, you should always want your website to be clear about how you can help your visitors.
Not only should it be clear, but visitors should know right away whether or not you can satisfy their needs, you want them to feel like they are in exactly the right place. If they have to surf around on your site to figure out what your business does, you’re going to lose them to a competitor.
I suggest that your home page clearly state the various problems that your business can solve and make it easy to navigate the website with a functional menu.
3. Too Much or Not Enough Going on
It’s tempting to include as many design elements, widgets, and high-resolution images as possible on your landing pages. But, when you overdo these things, it’ll overwhelm your visitors’ sense of what’s important, which should always be convincing them to use your service.
Be thoughtful about what you include on landing pages, but you don’t want to go too far in the opposite direction. Do your best to make your landing pages attractive and entertaining. Write enough content to explain what you do and the transformation this provides your clients but don’t confront them with a wall of text, keep it concise and useful.
Striking the right balance between too much and not enough is difficult, but it will make a huge difference in keeping visitors engaged.
4. Unclear Branding
The key to branding is the complete understanding of your audience and your business’ core values. When you know what your audience wants to see, you can build a strong brand identity around those things.
From the colours you use to the typography, to the voice you have in your website copy, product descriptions and blog posts; everything should seem like it’s from the same place. Building a brand that your customers are familiar with as soon as they see your website is what will turn it into a true moneymaker. Consistency is key here.
5. No Clear Calls to Action
The purpose of your site is to give your visitors a place to learn more about your business and purchase your products and services. If you don’t lead them to the right areas on the site, they’ll look elsewhere.
At the end of your pages, blog posts and product pages, give your visitors a clear call to action. A CTA is a turn of phrase or a concluding statement that you can put on your landing pages or at the end of blog posts to tell visitors what to do next. Don’t forget to add a link, or better a button that clearly stands out.
A vague CTA isn’t going to accomplish anything, so make sure that you’re giving clear directions on where to go and what to do. For instance, if you offer virtual assistant services your homepage call to action may be to contact you, book a call or request more information about your packages.
6. Weak SEO
Search engine optimisation is how you get your website noticed in the haystack of other websites like yours. If you can appeal to Google’s algorithms and the things your ideal customers search for on Google, then all of your hard work is more likely to pay off and your business will see a lot of growth.
It’s not as easy as it sounds, however. SEO has become an industry unto itself due to its sheer importance, so you might consider hiring an SEO expert to help you with it. There are things you can do yourself, though; check out my Ultimate Guide to SEO ebook to learn more.
Using a company blog to put out informative and engaging content will help bring more users to your site, but also keep them there and establish you as an authority in your field. Long-tail keywords (phrases with 4 or more words) are more conversational and more in-line with how people actually perform searches today, they may also be less competitive terms to get visible for.
When you use a website builder, the templates aren’t usually set up with good SEO in mind. Make sure to take extra measures and avoid overloading your site with things that will slow it down. You should also check that there is appropriate use of headings throughout any imported layouts if you have DIYed your website.
7. Not Easy to Read
Many sites have a font that’s simply too small to read, no structure to their content or just poor design choices.
If you want to communicate clearly, your font should be at least 16 pixels and easy to read on any background you use. Use headings to break up your content and allow site visitors to scan for the information they want. Use enough space around elements and sections to give everything room to breathe.
Don’t go too crazy with modern or funky font styles and make sure the colour stands out against the background and images on your landing pages and you should be fine.
Don’t let website design mistakes cost you business
You don’t have to look too far to find examples of bad websites. Most businesses, especially ones that existed pre-internet, have a hard time keeping up with web design trends. Avoid these mistakes and contact me to book a free call if you’d like to chat about getting your website to stand out and convert.
