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It is easy to make website design mistakes if you are new to the online business world. After all, it can be easy to overwhelm, under-provide or even just forget a simple detail that can render your website incomplete and lead to poor performance metrics. Below, the professionals at BionicWP help identify the most common website design mistakes we see and provide simple tips to help avoid them.
Top 5 Website Mistakes
There are dozens of website design mistakes and faux pas you should avoid. However, the top 5 mistakes we see most often are as follows:
- Who Are You?
Your website design fails to immediately convey what your company does and why you are the best choice. Studies have shown that visitors form their opinion of you based on the first 5 seconds of clicking your site. Your homepage should identify the name of your business and the products or services you provide. Assurance-building and authoritative evidence, such as testimonials, awards, credentials, press releases, and industry affiliations, can also help gain the confidence of a visitor.
- Universal Responsiveness
Your website should be designed to look great and perform equally well on all devices. This includes desktop and mobile browsers. Responsive layouts recognize and adjust to the size of any screen, making each user experience easy and enjoyable. (According to studies, roughly 52% of all users stated that poor mobile experiences made them less likely to purchase or hire a company. In fact, 48% of users have claimed that websites that did not work on smartphones made them feel as if the company did not care.)
- Speed
On top of being responsive, your website design needs to load in 3 seconds or less! In fact, 47% of online viewers expect loading to take 2 seconds or less, hitting the back button if your site takes longer than 3 seconds.
- Readability
Fonts that are too small or hard to read are an immediate turn off to site visitors. In general, it is recommended that you stick with three (or fewer!) typefaces, with a body text above 14px. San Serif fonts, which are considered the easiest to read, are also recommended for their user-friendly scaling and device compatibility. Using high-contrast text-to-background combinations is also recommended to ensure text is easily distinguished from the background color.
- Easy Navigation
Navigation should be an important feature in your website design. Staying consistent with your navigation panel, and keeping your menu simple and short, can help improve user satisfaction.
Other Mistakes to Avoid with Your Business Website
Other mistakes we commonly see are plentiful as well. This includes:
- Social media icons or links featured at the top of your webpage. Why is this a problem? You worked hard to bring in your website traffic. Providing these links at the top of your webpage promptly invites them to leave! Post social media icons or links anywhere else but on the top! (Likewise, having a website that opens tons of new browser windows is a no-no!)
- Failure to provide contact information occurs more often than you realize. In fact, 64% of users want to see contact information and 44% will leave if they cannot easily find it!
- If your call-to-action (CTA) is not compelling, your visitor will be far less likely to take action.
- Improperly placed ads can detract from your site. Noisy, flashy, pop-ups or overwhelming amounts of ads on a webpage can lead to visitor loss.
- Avoiding the “too’s” is important. Too much content, too little content, and too confusing content are all major taboos in the world of online website design.
WordPress Makes It Easy
WordPress, as a content management system (CMS), is the most popular website design platform in the world. Why? Because it focuses on providing users with the most optimal websites around. WordPress websites are user-friendly, plugin and widget compatible, easy to design, fast, and multi-device compatible. Whether you are a professional website developer or not, WordPress makes designing, managing, updating and visiting your business website ideal and easy.
BionicWP Makes It Easier
BionicWP offers affordable WordPress hosting that keeps your business website running smoothly and safely. All of our various secure WordPress hosting packages are geared towards providing you with the service, support, and speeds you need to maintain a professional business website. From high-speed optimization, updates, off-site backups, daily security scans and more – our affordable WordPress hosting services give you peace of mind and professional support. If you want more, our BionicWP managed hosting packages provide even more assistance and services, including improved dashboards, and transparent pricing structures.
The experts at BionicWP want to help make your website successful. From individual or small team packages to large-scale agencies with more than 30 sites, we can help. Visit BionicWP today to learn more about our affordable WordPress hosting packages!
