Web Design Mistakes You Should Avoid 
Tip Sheet Credibility: 29
created by Inzalo
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Tip Sheet
| Make sure that all relevant information including links to the rest of your website fit on one page, without scrolling. Most people are not patient and prefer to get all the information they need without spending a lot of time looking around. Tip Credibility: 51 (Best Tip!) |
| Make your site hard to navigate & visitors will leave as soon as they arrive. Simplicity & consistency in your navigation is essential for people to initially understand what your site is about, & then dive in to use the information. Tip Credibility: 43 |
| Home pages which feature a Flash animation/intro not only annoy visitors, they are extremely poor for SEO purposes. Tip Credibility: 43 |
| Can a visitor determine what your site is about within just a few seconds? And that's NOT just your home page, but ALL your internal pages too. If not, they will leave fast. There's no chance of fixing a poor first impression on the net! Tip Credibility: 40 |
| Not everyone has super fast broadband. Remember users on slow ADSL/dialup. Limit the total number of pictures/page, & optimise the file size of any graphics you use. A fast loading page, with little waiting, is better for all visitors! Tip Credibility: 35 |
| Using a dark background and light font is the worst mistake you can make when designing a website. It makes everything hard to read and can even give you a headache. Tip Credibility: 35 |
| Offering too many choices/links on a web page will usually result in visitor confusion. Don't make it hard for them. Avoid offering too many options which DISTRACT visitors away from whatever your PRIMARY page objective is. Tip Credibility: 33 |
| Check your links! Often. Make sure ALL your links - to your OWN pages, and to other sites - are working! Nothing is more frustrating to your visitors than following a link which is dead! Tip Credibility: 33 |
| Avoid talking in the "we" tense... i.e. "We do this, we also do that!" Concentrate your web site copy on addressing your visitor and put them into the picture by using "You" as much as you can. Tip Credibility: 33 |
| Changing link colors & not underlining them can reduce their effectiveness. Unless there's a design need for it, stick to the DEFAULT colours (blue and purple) & keep links underlined. It's what people expect and are used to. Tip Credibility: 31 |
| Not everyone has 20" monitors running at super high res! So make your web page display width is no more than around 800 pixels wide. Check it on different monitors. This will help avoid another visitor nightmare - HORIZONTAL scrolling. Tip Credibility: 31 |
| If you include audio and or video on your page, consider letting your users START it themselves so you are not "in their face" as soon as they arrive at your page (could be awkward for those on the net at work) Tip Credibility: 31 |
| Unless you have a VERY good reason for it, avoid DARK backgrounds & light text - it's far too hard to read! Go for dark text on a light background. Good old black & white for content blocks - just like here on tipdrop - usually works best! Tip Credibility: 30 |
| Don't cram everything too close together. Here's a tip from the days of print... remember that? Make good use of WHITE SPACE! Use it to improve readability & to attract the eyes to elements you want people to click on. Tip Credibility: 30 |
| Is your web page compatible with different web browsers? Check it in different browser software, and on different computer operating systems, to see if there are any glaring problems that may need attention. Tip Credibility: 30 |
| "Pretty" is not always the best! A lot of "ugly" web sites have great conversion rates, which shows it is the MESSAGE that counts. But a business site should still look as "professional" as possible, as that adds to your credibility. Tip Credibility: 30 |
| Never subscribe the visitor for something without his consent: do not automatically subscribe a visitor to newsletters when he registers up on your site. Sending unsolicited emails around is not the best way to make friends.
Tip Credibility: 23 |
| I agree with not cramming stuff together. In a newspaper ad you are paying per square inch on a website the critical space is above the fold. Tip Credibility: 18 |
| If you want to get found by the search engines be sure to put your keyword in the title, a paragraph heading and in a link off the page. Then make anchor links to your page with the keyword as the anchor text. Tip Credibility: 18 |
| For our subscribers, we use a double opt-in. They sign up and then receive a confirmation email which contains a link they must click to confirm their subscription. Tip Credibility: 16 |
| Build links by commenting on other blogs. Work to build a relationship with other bloggers. After relationship building then try to get some Guest Blogger posts. You can write up a Guest Blogger post and PM it to a Blogger you have a relationship with. Tip Credibility: 8 |
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