10 WEB DESIGNMISTAKEST O A V O I D

website is usually the first digital touch-point for our audience. And we understand that designing an effective and attractive site is challenging. Therefore, here’s a quick checklist of what NOT to do…

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Unclear/Irrelevant Content

✦ Let’s not mislead or confuse our users. If they can't find the clear and relevant information within a few seconds, they will look elsewhere.

We recommend:

✦ Design a clean homepage layout

✦ Create enough whitespace between the text and imagery, with appropriate margins

✦ Make consistency your best friend, and update information regularly

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02 Complicated Graphics

✦ Skip the temptation to place flashy animations, cute GIFs or adorable cat pictures. They not only run the risk of being irrelevant but also annoy users. Remember that heavy graphics also delay load times on slow Internet connections.

We recommend:

✦ Optimize all videos and images

✦ Define a context for all the imagery

✦ Place ALT and TITLE attributes, to aid SEO and enhance usability

Poor Usability &Readability

✦ Clear usability and readability in a website is paramount. Refrain from using bizarre font styles and sizes that hinder easy reading.

We recommend:

✦ Use a sans serif typeface for easy reading on the web

✦ Place a traditional-looking font in a dark color against a light background

✦ Align all text uniformly, with clearly defined headings and sub-headings

03

Poor Navigation✦ Ensure that the website follows a single,

clearly-defined navigation structure. You don’t want to confuse or worse, lose a user because s/he was unable to arrive at the relevant page.

We recommend:

✦ Use text descriptions for all links

✦ Make it easy, obvious and intuitive

✦ Provide location information for each page, using breadcrumbs

04

UnfavorableScreen Resolutions &Browser Incompatibility

✦ Modern web design must take into account the numerous devices, browsers and screen sizes that will be used to view and engage with websites. Avoid an extensive horizontal scroll. It’s annoying!

We recommend:

✦ Know your users’ devices and the various screen sizes, with the help of Google Analytics

✦ Use responsive web design to fit all screen sizes

✦ Test for compatibility across devices and browsers

05

Autoplay✦ Nothing agitates a user more than

unsolicited music announcing their arrival on a particular website. On most occasions, it is nothing but a distraction and an irritant, often taking away from the content of a website.

We recommend:

✦ Keep it simple. Or hand over the controls to the user

06

An Inconsistently Designed Interface

✦ You might be tempted to go overboard with your creativity and design a new template for every page within a website. However, it’s imperative that we maintain a consistent look across the entire site.

We recommend:

✦ Use a consistent template across all the pages within a particular section

✦ Create clean and aesthetically simple designs

✦ Let users expect to find a pattern, making it easier for them to arrive at the information they need

07

No Call-to-Action✦ As marketers, we hope that our users would want to

view, download, subscribe, register, buy, share or follow content on our websites. Let’s make it simpler for them to do so.

We recommend:

✦ Begin your call-to-action with an action word, always

✦ Make the call-to-action easy to find; keep it big, keep it bold

✦ Limit it to 90-150 characters, removing all extraneous words

08

Pop Ups & Advertisements

✦ Pop-ups and advertisements are annoying, unnecessary and can even startle users. In fact, many people install pop-up and ad blockers in their browsers; this means that they either miss some content or have to manually approve each pop-up window we throw at them. Plus, the general tendency is to associate these hazards as being spammed. Simply put, avoid using them as far as possible.

09

A Missing Search Box

✦ Do not commit the cardinal sin of letting go off the search button on your website. Remember that the Internet was designed to be searched. And we must make it as simple as possible for users to find what they seek.

We recommend:

✦ Provide a search box at the top right-hand corner of every page

✦ Make it clearly visible, quickly recognizable and easy to use

✦ Keep it simple; do NOT over design it

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Thank You

Shruti Garodia

Sudarshana Majumdar

www.happymarketer.com

@hmarketer | hello@happymarketer.com