Your website is the digital presentation of your company. If you don't receive your customers in a sloppy and sloppy space, why make a bad impression with your website?
Discover the most common website design mistakes made by many companies on their own websites so that they can be avoided. Be careful and get a website worthy of WOW with our advice.
The most frequent errors in website design
Due to carelessness, ignorance... There are many reasons why you can end up making one of these web design mistakes. The important thing is to know them so as not to fall into the trap.
Errors 404
These are pages from our website that are no longer available. It is possible that the URL has changed or that the product, in the case of an electronic commerce, is out of print.
In any case, what they transmit to the visitor is a lack of interest in our website, as well as a bad user experience. If Google detects many pages of this type, it may interpret that the content of the web is not updated and penalize its positioning.
The best way to avoid them is to periodically browse our website to detect them using tools such as Google Search Console. This way, you can indicate to search engines that the content will no longer be available or redirect these pages.
Another way to improve the user experience is to customize the 404 error page. In this way, you transform a negative experience into a positive one, offering navigation alternatives and you can even make the user smile. For example, GitHub winked at Star Wars and invited you to search the site.
Pages too heavy
We are in favour of interaction, dynamic web content, beautiful images,... but always thinking about the function of each element.
Reloading your website with images, animations or videos can hinder navigation and especially slow down loading. And if the site loads slowly, you will have two problems: users will probably abandon it if it doesn't load within 3 seconds, and Google will penalize its positioning. Always optimize the images you upload to your website and do not add content without purpose.
Little content
Pages with little content are one of the most common design errors. Frequently, there are companies that want to include a page for each service they offer, but only include an image or a paragraph of text.
Always think about the user and synthesize as much as possible. If you just want to brush up on the services you offer, group them on the same page. You will avoid redundant content and the feeling of having wasted time clicking on a page that brings nothing new to it.
Black Hat SEO
A good SEO ranking is essential to position your site in search engines. But that does not mean that anything is allowed. Sometimes you will find designers who want to give you shortcuts to be the first in Google. Our advice is clear: go in the opposite direction.
Some of the practices that Google penalizes is the filling of keywords, or what is known as over-optimization of text, repeating keywords in an abusive and unnatural way. In the same line, something that was done years ago was to include text of the same color as the background of the page so that it would only be visible by search engines.
Another Black Hat SEO technique is Cloaking, which consists in displaying content for search engine robots while the user is redirected to different content. Currently, this is an action taken by Google that can only lead to a penalty.
Common sense; always bet on quality texts, content that interests your users and is optimized, but that is consistent and natural and you will have no problem.
Designing according to a fashion
As in any other discipline, web design also has fashions and trends. However, redesigning a website based exclusively on a fashion, without working on your corporate identity, will only result in a website that will be very fashionable in the first few months, but will be outdated in a short period of time. Face the clones, let yourself be inspired by trends and bring them to your identity.
Poor quality images
Just as we talked about large images, you cannot fall into the extreme opposite and use poor quality, pixelized or distorted images.
Images are of fundamental importance, especially in the case of online shops.
Whenever possible, use original images, showing your installations, products, etc. Otherwise, use quality image banks.
Wrong colour combination
The user must be the centre of the website design. If content is worked on, but the combination of colours makes it unreadable, the user leaves the page.
Always trust the designers. The experts will advise you on the best colour scheme to provide a good user experience.
Poorly legible typography
In the same context as the previous error, choose the typography of the site carefully. Sometimes, in search of originality, we choose typographies that are not adapted to the screens.
Choose, as far as possible, serif or sans serif fonts, with a sufficient size for reading. Normally, the minimum size to ensure a good reading is 16px.
Too much text
Paste text without end or formatting, never. On the web, users tend to scan, rather than read in depth. Use bold headings, important headings and short paragraphs to make it easier for users to find what they are looking for.
Complex navigation
Raising bad web architecture is a very common web design error. The information on your website must always be easily accessible. There is a maximum if we are talking about web design and usability: no user should have to make more than 3 clicks from the home page to access a section.
Menus with endless sub-menus, many service pages with very little information... There are many bad practices that can be seen in this direction. Plan the structure of your website well on paper and, if possible, group the content together with your users' needs in mind.
How to avoid web errors
It is easy to avoid the most common web errors if you work with the right team. Contact a web design agency or proven professional.
All the professionals in our network have been certified in a very rigorous process to ensure the quality of each project. By relying on us as your digital partner, you will avoid problems when approaching your website design project.
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