Top 10 Website Mistakes You Should Avoid Making

Websites are essential for modern day businesses.

But it’s not enough for your business to simply be online. Your website has to perform well in order to convert your visitors to customers.

Not getting enough visitors? Or noticing that a lot of people leave your website without buying anything or getting in touch.

You could be making a mistake that’s causing you to lose out on valuable sales. Let’s change that, by discovering what 10 of the most common website mistakes are, and how you can avoid them.

1.  You’re not telling your visitors what’s in it for them

Everyone is selfish. That may seem harsh, but it’s true.

When your visitors go onto your website, there’s only one thing they want to know: what’s in it for them.

Many websites make the mistake of not telling people what this is. They spend too long going on about themselves, rather than saying exactly what their visitors want to hear.

So, tell them why they should care.

This means writing benefit-driven copy, that doesn’t just mention that your salon offers haircuts. It means telling them that they’re going to have a completely fresh new look that will give them a confidence boost every time they look in the mirror.

2.  It’s not relevant

Your website doesn’t just need to be useful, it also needs to be relevant to what they are expecting. Which means covering all the essential information and organising your site in a way that makes sense.

Here’s a fact: if users can’t find what they’re looking for on your website, 79% of them will leave and look somewhere else.

That’s a lot of potential customers lost.

3.  It’s not mobile friendly

Giving access to nearly everything at our fingertips, people spend an amazing 59% of their time on mobile phones.

This means that when your customers find your website, there’s a good chance they’ll be looking at it from their mobile phone. And you better be ready for it, otherwise, you could lose out on these customers.

A great way to do this is through responsive design, which will automatically resize itself depending on the device. So, your customers will always see the best version of your site, no matter where they’re browsing on.

4.  It’s too slow

How long do you spend waiting for a website to load before you give up and try elsewhere?

We bet it’s not as long as you think.

That’s because 40% of users will give up on a website after only 3 seconds.

This means that if your website is slow, you’ve lost nearly half of your users already. Yikes. It is not that hard to have a fast loading website nowadays, the time and effort it will take to optimize your loading speed mainly depends on how much content you have on your site. Before optimizing your content, you must go through the fundamentals first such as switching to a faster web hosting provider or choose a completely new one if you’re just developing your website. Deciding if you want to use a CDN, but some hosting providers already offer that service.

5.  It’s too hard or confusing to use

Never sacrifice usability for design.

Sometimes websites look really good, but they’re too confusing or difficult to use. And if your visitors can’t even use your website, how are they going to buy from you?

Instead, make your website as simple as possible.

This means not hiding any important pieces of information or making them navigate through several pages to find what they’re looking for.

6.  You’re sending your customers away

If you’re on social media, it’s a good thing to advertise it on your website and includes links to your profiles.

But ultimately, you don’t want to send your visitors away. You want to keep them on your website and convert them into customers.

So, keep your links smaller and towards the bottom of the page. That way you still get the benefit – without losing all your traffic.

7.  It’s not https secure

Look to the left of the address bar at the top of your screen, where you should see a lock symbol.

This means that the website you’re on is https secure.

If your website doesn’t have an https security certificate, you won’t have this lock symbol. Instead, your users will see the words ‘not secure’ in its place – which will damage their trust in you.

You can get SSL certificates from the company that’s hosting your website – or even through websites such as Let’s Encrypt.

8.  You don’t have any contact information

Your customers can’t contact you if they don’t know how.

So, make sure to add your contact information, including your phone number, email and address, to your website.

This information doesn’t just give your users a way to contact you. It also adds an extra sense of credibility to your website, helping build trust with your users.

9.  You’re ignoring SEO rules

SEO stands for Search Engine Optimisation and is what helps your customers find you on search engines like Google.

The higher you rank, the more traffic you’re likely to get to your website.

There are many things you can do to help your SEO, but the most important thing to remember is to provide good, high-quality content that isn’t duplicated anywhere else.

This also means not trying to get your keyword into your content as many times as possible.

This is called keyword stuffing – which is bad news for your SEO. That’s because it drags the quality of your content down and makes your website difficult for your users to read.

10. You don’t have a CTA

A CTA (Call To Action) is a short, snappy statement that tells your customers exactly what it is you want them to do.

Whether it’s to call your company, place an item in their basket or visit your store. There’s always something you need them to do. The truth is, they’re never going to do it if you don’t tell them.

So, make sure you spell it out for them, loud and clear with engaging CTAs.

Need a hand with your website?

You never have to do anything completely by yourself.

There’s thousands of helpful articles, tools and advice out there that you can use to your advantage.

Want to build your website yourself? DIY website builders like Wix or Weebly are a great place to get started.

However, if you wanted to leave it to the experts, companies like Adzooma will take care of the hard work for you. Just tell them about your company, and they’ll design, write and build your own custom website.Whether you’re building your website on your own or trusting the experts, just remember to avoid these common mistakes and you’ll see success in no time.