The importance of having a website that is easy to use, looks professional, and drives traffic and sales, cannot be underestimated. Nowadays, a business’ online presence is critical to their overall success. However, the Internet is still littered with web design and development flaws. Is your business guilty of any? Read on to discover some of the website mistakes that you could be making that will be hurting your business.
Your analytic data is lacking - At the heart of every good business is one’s ability to learn from the mistakes they have made. However, if you do not have access to valuable data and you do not analyse it effectively, you will never be able to do this. You need to have valuable analytics and KPIs in place to determine the performance of your website and where improvements need to be made.
Your website is difficult to navigate - When a user visits a website, they should be able to head to the page they need instinctively. They shouldn’t have to go searching. It is a good idea to get the opinions of several people that you trust. You can instruct them to carry out various tasks on your website, for example, ‘contact our company’ or ‘place an order’, and see whether they find it easy to do so or not. If it is the latter, it is time to make some changes to the navigation of your website.
Information on your website is out of date - If you want to cause frustration amongst your customers, this is the way to do it. All of the information on your website needs to be up-to-date. This includes everything from product details to contact information to delivery timescales. An outdated website shows a distinct lack of professionalism, which will severely hurt your brand image.
Your website is not optimised for SEO - You can have the most beautiful website on the Internet, but if it is not optimised for SEO, what is the point? No one will visit your website, and all of your efforts will be lost. It is vital to have a search engine optimisation strategy in place so that your website features high up on the result pages. There are many different techniques you can use to boost your search engine ranking, from incorporating strong, relevant content to naturally incorporating searchable keywords.
Your website is offline - Do you have periods where your website is online? Nothing will hurt your business more. By having periods where people cannot access your website, you are missing out on revenue, diluting customer loyalty, and hurting your search engine ranking. If this sounds familiar, now is the time to find a new website hosting provider. Take the time to read customer feedback, such as A2 host reviews, on independent platforms so that you can find the best provider for you.
Lack of contact information - It is so important to display your business’ phone number and email address on your website, and make sure it is easy to find. Failure to do so can result in your business appearing untrustworthy.
A bad CTA - Your call to action is the gateway to your business. It commands users to take a specific action, for example, to place an order or to sign up to your newsletter. Your CTA needs to be simple and tell users exactly what they need to do. There is a fine line between being annoying and being helpful, so make sure you find the right balance and ensure your CTA is placed strategically on your website.
Your website is too confusing - This is one of the biggest mistakes that businesses are making with their website. There is often a temptation to include everything, i.e. as many themes, colour palettes, images, and typefaces as possible. However, all this is going to do is create one big mess! Simplicity is best. Make sure that your website is consistent so that it aptly represents your brand image.
Your website is not responsive - Last but not least, this is one of the biggest sins in the web design world at present. So many people access websites via their smartphone or tablet today, and you need to ensure that your website is optimised for such devices. If your site is difficult to read or users have to use the dread pinch-and-zoom, it is likely that they will simply leave your website and head elsewhere. Make sure that your website responds to the device it is being viewed on so that all users have an enjoyable and easy experience.
