The Indextrialist

Below are some of the top ten or should I say worst ten design mistakes made when building a company website. It’s easy to do and more common than you think. Ok it is as common as you think, but with a little patience and research you can avoid getting caught in the trap of a “bad company website”.

Hers is the list that you should try to avoid when building.

#10. Flaming Gifs. We have all seen them, the flaming letters or the flaming animated guitar. This is a personal pet peeve of mine. It hurts to even look at and I won’t even stay on the site even if they have something I was looking for. If they were tricked into using a flaming gif, then how can I justify doing business with that company. Again, your site is your business card and your reputation going out to the world, not just to your local neighborhood. You have the opportunity with a website to show yourself as a big player in the business world and to gain business in markets that you did not think possible. Do you really want to throw a “flaming Gif” from the mid 90s on your website?

#9. Microsoft FrontPage. If you have it, burn it! There is nothing worse than looking at a company site with Microsoft trademark bevels and ugly backgrounds. It will make your site look like it was built in 1993.

#8. Building for the bottom 5% of internet users. By this I mean if 95 % of your users are using high speed internet and at least a 1024 x 768 resolution. Don’t design for the 5% that are using a 28.8 modem and 640 x 480 monitor resolution. They are not your customer. Don’t make your customers suffer.

#7. Poor Navigation. There is nothing worse than looking for information or something you want from a company site and you can’t find anything. Navigation does not have to be the same, it can be fun and experimental, but it does need to be logical.

#6. No content on the site. It is never more frustrating to have a site that is just there for the sake of having a site and nothing else. You go to the site and there are 3 pages and just a couple of pictures and nothing else…and the point is?

#5. No images on the site. I know I know, I just said nothing worse than having a couple of pages with only pictures but…if you have all content an no pictures, you look like a text book and will lose your audience. Remember, people browsing your page will stay an average of only 3 to 5 seconds if they do not find something they want or, are bored. Don’t bore your audience.

#4. Poor Images. If you are going to put images or pictures on your site, make sure they are of good quality. Nothing (besides frontpage) makes you look smaller as a company than really bad images on your site. Remember, your site is your business card online. Do you really want to hand someone your name scratched on a piece of paper as your business card. Then why would you do that on your site.

#3. Non-SEO friendly. So you have built a beautiful site and it has all the bells and whistles and it has all your information that customers will need. So why can’t anyone find you? Well, you need to be seen in the search engines. You can have the greatest looking site and best product in the world, but if know one can find you, how is that going to help your business?

#2. No contact information on the homepage. This may sound trivial as you have information on your contact page. But again, this is the time of A. D. D., where you need to have people know where to be able to contact you right away. Hiding your information can lose you business!!

#1. Your cousins’ best friend builds web sites. We have all seen them, the site your friends 2nd cousin built on his home computer. Now there are exceptions, but for the most part, you can refer to #9 on this one as it always seems that someone buys FrontPage and they instantly become a web designer. Throwing a couple of pictures with a link or 2 does not count as web design, run away…fast.

There are so many more don’ts that we could discuss, but these are a good starting point. Check back soon and I will talk about some good design basics. You don’t need to have an award winning site to gain business, but there are some basics to follow so that people want to come back and see what your business has to offer.

• 10 Ways Good Photography Will Make a Better Website
• Design for Your Users
• Own Your Own Domain
• What’s Your Story & Why Should I buy from you?
• Why Your Website Needs a Site Map

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, June 5th, 2007 @ 7:54 pm on the category Web Design. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.