7 Common Web Design Mistakes — How Can You Avoid Them?

A quick search for ‘bad web design examples’ throws up interesting results. While only a few are outright bad, most websites in that lot are guilty of, say, one or two web design mistakes. Some lack a responsive web design while others have complicated navigation, inappropriately placed CTAs (Calls to action), too much or too little empty space, irregular text size or even a mismatched color scheme. These seemingly isolated web design issues, however, have an outsized influence on the popularity of a website. For instance, the above-mentioned issues could inconvenience mobile users, cause confusion among visitors or worse still, irritate them enough to quit your website within a few seconds.

Why Web Design Matters

Before delving deeper into how web design mistakes affect a website’s prospects and what you can do to avoid them, let’s understand why good web design is important. Say, you visit a store to buy an item. You walk to the section where that item is displayed only to be greeted by several different brands selling the same item. The human mind is wired to find the easiest and least stressful solution to a problem. In this context, the sensible thing would be to read the information on each brand’s packaging before making a decision. But it’s also the most stressful, especially if you have a dozen brands staring back at you. So, what’s the easiest and least time-consuming solution here? You glance at the design of the item’s packaging. The brand that has buyer-friendly design elements (attractive design, easy to read information, pleasant color scheme, etc.) on its packaging usually bags your attention, and your money.

In the World Wide Web, your website is the packaging for what you’re selling. A web design company that knows its stuff will create a website that grabs the visitor’s attention, presents content in an easy-to-consume style, allows smooth navigation of your website and nudges them towards taking an action.

7 Web Design Mistakes to Avoid

Now that we’re clear about the importance of a good website for business, let’s take a stab at some common mistakes that can be avoided when creating a business website.

1) Muddled Messaging

Did you know a visitor takes just 0.05 seconds to form an opinion about your site? Studies have shown that’s all the time you have to create a good impression in the visitor’s mind. While creating a positive perception every time can be difficult, the very least you can do is avoid things that generate a negative impression. Foremost among them is muddled messaging. If a visitor isn’t able to quickly understand what your business is about, they will quit your website without pause. This holds truer in the B2B space, where the visitor often knows precisely what they want. You can avoid this pitfall by following homepage best practices like,

i) displaying your products/services/logo clearly and prominently

ii) placing easy to read text that is attractive and crisp

iii) including trust-building elements like client testimonials

Together, these aspects shape your message in a coherent manner, which encourages the visitor to explore more of your website.

2) Mobile Unfriendly

In 2009, less than 1% of webpages were served to mobile phones. For 2018, that figure shot up to 52%. Search engines like Google have recognized this shift in usage pattern and have adapted their algorithms to reward websites with a responsive and mobile-friendly design. The intimate nature of mobile phones also means users generally prefer them over desktops or laptops to look up a website on the go. A good web design company recognizes these parameters and implements an apt design and development process, irrespective of whether it’s a B2C or a B2B website.

So, what does a website with responsive web design look like?

i) it adjusts as per a device’s screen orientation

ii) doesn’t require visitors to squint

iii) has easy to locate navigation buttons and links

iv) offers a fast and smooth user experience

3) Snail-like Loading Speed

Did you know that 47% of users expect a web page to fully load in less than 2 seconds? Let’s assume the rest are generous enough to wait for twice that much for a web page to load fully. That still means just 5 seconds before a user decides to quit an incompletely-loaded web page. This can prove a costly loss, especially if your product or service is exactly what the visitor is looking for.

Good website design isn’t enough if your web page doesn’t load fast enough. Here are some things you can do to quicken your website’s loading speed,

i) optimize images on your site, especially the homepage

ii) update all plugins and themes on your site

iii) test your site thoroughly before making live

4) Awkward Font, Colour & Style

Using clear text with a soothing color in the background is one of the most underrated web design principles. Such a style increases the readability of your content. This means visitors can understand what you’ve written without stressing themselves out. On the contrary, the font that is too fancy or too small and accompanied by garish background color (s) will trouble your visitors. In a worst case scenario, it could mean they gloss over your call to action or even leave your site altogether.

To encourage the visitor to read your site’s content and goad them into taking an action, you can

i) use a simple font style and keep the size 14 or higher

ii) use colors that facilitate easy reading (white, beige, sepia, etc.)

iii) highlight call to action in a non-intrusive manner

5) Social Media Hogs the Limelight

Yes, social media is a vital part of a business’s web presence nowadays. But when a web designer places your social media handles right at the top of your website, they act as distractions. A visitor might click one of those social media buttons and never come back, which nullifies the very purpose of your website. The aim of creating a website is to inform or educate a visitor about your business. In keeping with that principle, your content should get the highest priority on your website. As for social media buttons, place them anywhere except the top.

6) Lack of Essential Information

A visitor arrives on your site with the hope of finding what they want. If your product or service matches their search, they look for other information essential to the buying or signing-up process. This can include your business’s physical address, telephone number or other contact information, business hours and call-to-action items like contact forms. If a visitor doesn’t find this information (or not easily enough), they will become frustrated and leave your website. You can avoid this by submitting all the information about your business to the web design company right at the start.

7) No Security (HTTPS)

An important part of any web design checklist, lack of security is frowned upon by not only visitors but search engines as well. That’s because any website that collects information (as part of their CTA or otherwise) must be secured failing which, it’ll be penalized by search engines.

Some other reasons to have your website HTTPS secured include,

i) HTTPS sites load faster than HTTP sites

ii) around 40% of Google’s first-page search results are HTTPS

iii) Google Chrome, the world’s most popular web browser, flags HTTP sites as insecure

Your Website is Your Salesperson

Good presentation and communication is the hallmark of a good salesperson in real life. A good web designer, alongside a quality front end developer, applies the same principle to the virtual world when creating your website. The end result is a site that not only looks great but also communicates with a potential customer as a real person would. Now isn’t that what an engaging and interactive website experience is all about!