There’s no denying it: if you want your business to be successful, it needs a good website. Maybe your current one looks a little dated, or worse, is nonexistent. So you want to hire a marketing agency to design a website that makes your business look great. But how do you know if an agency really knows their stuff? Well, if you’re marketing agency makes any of the following website design mistakes, it may be time to look somewhere else.
They Don’t Connect With Your Target Audience
Your agency had better know who it is you’re marketing to and no, it’s not everyone. You can’t please everyone and if you try, your website is going to turn out messy and confused. Identify your target market and focus on them and their interests, wants and needs. This isn’t the time to make your dream webpage with everything you want and don’t let the agency just put in whatever they want. Make sure you tailor the content and tone to your customers.
Improper Use of Logos and Colors
Your site should match the message, service, product or anything you’re trying to market. First, make sure your logo is located at the top of every page and that clicking it will bring the user to the home page. Also pick an appropriate and consistent color scheme. For example, if you are creating a website for swimming instruction, a light blue is probably more appropriate than bright yellows or pinks.
Requiring Registration
Users get annoyed when they want to use your site and then get accosted for their email address. Nothing will make a visitor leave your website faster than getting bombarded with requests for their personal information. Don’t send them newsletters without their consent. If you really want registration, be sure to emphasize the benefits of your business and your product or service. Interested customers will subscribe to your newsletter no matter what.
Obtrusive Advertisements
You might need advertisements on your page in order to keep content free. However, try to make sure they are not annoying. Avoid pop-up ads and ads that make noise. Don’t mingle ads with your content, such as placing outside links in the middle of text and refrain from having ads that interrupt browsing with an ad that visitors have to manually skip.
Misusing Flash
Adobe Flash can be a great tool to add animation to logos and slide shows, or make your website more interactive. But it should be used sparingly. Having important content in Flash makes it difficult for users to copy and paste the information if they want to search for more information. When using Flash, keep in mind that your visitors may be more annoyed than impressed at being forced to sit through a pretty animated splash page. A simple and clear web page is infinitely better than one jammed with bells and whistles. If you need any more reasons, keep in mind that Flash is often not compatible with mobile devices, and more people are accessing the web on tablets and smartphones.
Unclear Text
The first issue you’ll want to avoid is not having any. Search engines will scan your site for certain words and will move it closer to the top of the results depending on what’s written there. So include well-written, concise blocks of text with your pictures. Make sure your words have a clear purpose. Make especially sure to prominently display your website’s purpose above the fold (at the top of the page without scrolling down). If it’s to promote awareness or a specific product, make that clear. Center-orienting your text looks unprofessional, especially for bullet points. Don’t put text in all-caps because IT’S LIKE SHOUTING AT YOUR READER.
Eye-Straining Design
Keep in mind that your web designer might know html, but lacks knowledge of a good visual design. Get a second opinion from someone who isn’t afraid to state his or her opinion. If they can’t stand to look at your web page for more than a few seconds, there’s a problem. Nothing should flash or blink, and don’t overload your page with information or pictures. Stick to one or two uniform fonts and text color. For example, take a look at the Don Swanson Racing School website. The use of yellow, green, red and dark blue text makes very difficult to read.
Improper Linking
A good rule of thumb is that you want all important information to be accessible in three clicks or less from the home page. If you want to make words into a hyperlink, don’t do something like “To visit our staff page, click here” with the “here” being a link. This is considered a bad practice; instead make the words “staff page” a link, which makes navigation a little more intuitive. Also, don’t underline anything that isn’t a link (some of you just tried to click that ‘here’ I underlined).
Improperly Labeling Buttons
Depending on your site’s design, you may prefer to have visitors click buttons instead of text with links, in order to navigate. If you create buttons, make sure they are clearly labeled. Don’t make your customer hover the mouse over the button before the label appears to figure out where it leads to. If you completely leave out labels, they will resort to checking the URL of the linked page (usually it appears in the bottom-left of your browser). Or maybe they will just visit your competitor.
Inconsistency
Each page of your website should look like the others. Have a consistent color scheme, make all your buttons and links the same color and shape, and make the text font and size the same.
No Reason to Come Back
You have a successful site if you have a group of regulars who keep returning to it. The catch is, you need to give them new content. Make a weekly or biweekly blog or video. Post coupons, specials and promotions. Keep them interested and/or entertained and they will keep coming back.
Not Tailoring Design for Visitors
This is probably the single most important aspect to remember. If you keep this in mind, all other problems melt away. No matter what you’re making a website for, it’s purpose is always to make visitors’ lives easier. Resist the urge to try to wow them with special effects and shiny buttons. You’ll end up irritating them instead. Find out why your customers want to visit your site, and always make the most desirable information easy to find and access. Remember, your goal is to help and/or please your customers, so the website should be specially made for them, not you and your business. After all, without them, you wouldn’t have a business.
No Brainers
- Don’t include animated GIFs in your site; they are distracting.
- Don’t make your site automatically scroll anywhere and don’t incorporate horizontal scrolling.
- Don’t make music or videos play automatically.
- Don’t make your URL too long and complicated. A simpler one is easier to remember and ranks better with search engines.
The good news is that a lot of common problems are easily identifiable before you hire a marketing agency. Just look at their previous work and make sure it’s easy to use and appears professional. Remember that your web page is supposed to represent your company and everything it stands for, so make your best impression and hire a proper website designer!