20 Things People Hate About Your Website

20 Things People Hate About Your Website Do you want to create a website that is guaranteed to attract and keep visitors? Developing a web presence that audience loves is easy – if you avoid the twenty things people hate about websites. Whether it be through smartphones, laptops, tablets, or home computers, almost everyone can easily obtain the vast and overwhelming source of information that makes up the world-wide web. It goes without saying that online sources are full of useful and popular web pages that people visit again and again because they love what is offered at that particular page. However, many websites they visit leave a terrible impression that makes them never want to return. We’ve searched high and low to reveal the top twenty things that people hate about your website to guide you to create a site that they will love! Copy Mistakes Listed below are the most common mistakes made when it comes to your website’s text content, better known as the copy. 1. Your Copy is Over-Saturated with Keywords In years past, the way search engines found webpages was by the amount of keywords within the copy. Today, search engines are much smarter and are able to find what you are searching for without the use of keyword density. While keyword density is important for SEO (search engine optimization) when you have too many keywords in the copy, it makes it unreadable for those who visit your website!   2. Confusing About Us Page The about us page should be exactly about the website your guests are visiting. When you do not have a clear and easy to understand about us page, your visitors will feel confused and overwhelmed at not knowing the exact products or services you offer.   3.  Lack of a Blog A blog is a great way to boost your SEO, but it is also a great tool to connect to your website visitors. Blogs can give a great source of information and   they will boost traffic to your site just so long as the blog you offer readers is interesting and updated often. Blogs can also be sources of Frequently Asked Questions and their answers to assist your visitors with an issue without having to contact customer service. 4. Call to Actions that Do Not Match Offers The calls to action that you feature on your website should coincide with the offers you are promoting to your visitors. Nothing will frustrate people more   than being told they will receive a 50% off discount if they buy now. Only to find out there are more strings attached to the promotion such as: must spend X amount of money, selected items only, or applicable for in-store purchases only. When your call to action doesn’t match the offers, your reputation will suffer, but more importantly, so will your conversion rates. 5. Headlines That Misguide Readers Catchy and interesting titles and headlines within your copy are great and useful ways to attract the reader’s attention. Just bear in mind that if your copy doesn’t match the title, you will become known as a ‘click bait’ site or one that attracts readers because of the title. Once they reach the website, they quickly realize the information they were looking for is not there and they will leave. Not to mention misleading headlines annoy readers and create distrust. 6. Contact Forms Instead of Contact Information When your website does not feature basic contact information such as email, phone number, and/or address your visitors will not be able to contact you! Sometimes websites will use a contact form. Contact forms are a fill in the blank information box that will store the data provided by the website visitor and will leave the communication up to the team behind the website. This is unreliable for visitors and many people nowadays feel uncomfortable with giving out personal information over the Internet. 7. Unclear Descriptions of What Your Company Does This is just as bad as having a mashed up About Us page. When you have visitors to your site and your website is not intuitive enough to show exactly what your company does, it will create feelings of confusion and mistrust. If you cannot make your visitors stay for more than fifteen seconds, they will be more than likely to abandon your site to never return. Visual Mistakes Websites must be visually appealing to visitors. This will help encourage them to stay on the site and even return knowing they will have an enjoyable experience. 8.  Using Obvious Stock Photos It’s alright to employ the use of stock photos from time to time, but be careful which ones you select for your website! It is painfully obvious when a website is using tacky, generic, or even cheesy stock photos. Images should be used on your website to help your visitors. Using generic photos serve no purpose when it comes to being helpful to your visitors. 9. Using Distracting Animations Animations can be fun and entertaining for your website visitors, but take caution when thinking about using them for your website. Often times, people find that animations are distracting as the constant movements take the eyes away from the text they are trying to read. For example, if your website does not pass the three second blink test (the crucial three seconds it takes for visitors to decide to stay on the page or not), they will click the back button. Obtrusive and distracting animations can cause your site to fail the three second blink test and if you are interested in using animations on your webpage, make sure to do so the right way! 10. Not Knowing What to Do While this is the most obvious visual aspect of your websites, many webpages out there have no indication as to what the visitor is supposed to do once they arrive. If you’re an online store that shoppers cannot easily access products or they cannot figure out how to use your site, guess what? They will shop somewhere else. The same goes for every single type of website, whether you are on online store or not. If your visitors cannot figure out what to do, then they will head somewhere else for what they need. 11. There Are Too Many Pop Ups If there is any one thing that will turn people away from your website, it is the use of pop ups. No one likes them. No one. If you are using them on your site, please take the steps to remove them! People find pop ups annoying and sometimes difficult to close. Besides, pop up ads will distract your visitor from the main purpose of visiting your site in the first place. 12. Sliders Take Too Long to Load Using image sliders are popular choices for web design and when they are done right, you can have a visually appealing website. On the contrary, if your site has loaded nearly 90% of the way and your visitors still cannot see the slider image, they will find that they will have to wait too long for your site to do its thing and they will become bored and search elsewhere. User Interface Mistakes When it comes to websites, user interface is one of the most important factors in attracting and keeping visitors on your page. When user interface is done right, your visitors will have no trouble and even enjoy using your website. If the design and usability is unfriendly or not functioning properly, you will find that you will have unhappy visitors whose numbers continue to dwindle. 13. Unable to Contact Customer Service There are hundreds of websites that offer instant connections with customer service agents, whether they are live or virtual. When you see the pop up or prompt to use their online customer service and you actual go to do so, chances are you are already frustrated due to an issue you are experiencing. As a visitor you automatically expect the online customer service tools to work and function so you can be assisted with your issue. When these things are not working, visitors can become outraged and confused, not knowing where they need to go for help with their problem. Furthermore, if you have your customer service contact information listed on your site, make sure it is accurate and that your customers are able to reach someone. 14. Not Mobile or Tablet Optimized Today people are accessing the Internet via the smallest devices possible. Yet, there are still plenty of sites out there that do not work on mobile phones or tablets. This can be caused by the lack of mobilization in the design and code structure. To put it simply, some webpages are not built or coded, to adjust to the smaller screens which will prevent the entire thing from loading at all. Mobilization ensures that your website will work on: iPhones Tablets Android phones Laptops with small screens In short, the mobile-optimized site can be accessible for your audience from any device. 15. Poor Navigation Tools Poor navigation within a website will leave your visitors confused and frustrated, as they will not know what to do or how to find something on your site. Having a search bar or navigation bar that functions properly and is easy to use will allow your visitors to find exactly what they need in just a few clicks. Phrasing the navigation copy, how to properly analyze visitor’s flow, are used to make a website easy to search though. Take time to design your site and make sure you can achieve the perfect website navigational tools. 16.  Struggling to Buy Products When you are buying anything online, all you want is for this process to be quick and painless. There are several websites that commit what is known as two-site syndrome and their users go to click on something and it leads you to another site to complete the task that should have been done on the first website. Two-site syndrome has shown to decrease conversion rates, and make the customer experience a miserable one. Take our advice and avoid the two-site syndrome so your customers can make their online purchases as hassle free. Overall Website Mistakes 17. No Social Media Icons Social media is one of the greatest ways to connect and network between current and future customers. It is so common and very easy for visitors to share with their family and friends by using the social media icons found on the website. Social media icons make it instant and did I mention ‘easy’ for your guests to share what they love about your site! Not to mention, when your site and content can be spread across several social media platforms, your site will be able to see a boost in SEO and your page ranks according to your search browser. A quick list of social media icons all online business should or need to have: Facebook Instagram Twitter Imgur Tumblr Google+ Flickr 18.  Auto-Playing Videos   We’ve all been to those annoying sites that startle you when they catch you off guard with their loud and unexpected video that begins to play out of nowhere. People across the globe find those auto-playing videos on websites to be insulting, distracting, and annoying as they are reported to be one of the worst tactics for webpages. 19. Internal Links that Lead Nowhere Crosslinks also known as internal links, are links within the webpage that keep your visitors on your page or provide a gateway to another useful website, are excellent tools for allowing your visitor to learn more or continue searching for related topics. When you go to click on an interesting link and you end up nowhere, you will become frustrated and even decide to leave the entire site behind. This all comes down to not having proper function and this alone will change the minds of your visitors. If you do have internal links, always make sure for them to open with a fully separate tab. Many times, customers will click on a link and want to continue reading or examining your website. In this case allow them to stay on the page they are reading and let the link they clicked on open up in a whole new tab so they do not lose their place! 20. Takes Too Long to Load Going back to the point made about the three second blink test, people want things to happen fast! Unless the Internet connection is fully to blame for a slow load time of a webpage, you need to do everything you can to allow your site to load fast. The longer it takes for your website to load, the more people will search elsewhere and abandon your site completely. In today’s world, many people seek instant gratification. This is especially true for using the Internet and accessing websites. According to a study, 40% of your sites visitors will leave if it takes longer than three seconds to load. Luckily, there are ways to test the site’s load time and you can make sure to take the steps to adjust where you need to in order to pass these tests. Once you have tested your load time check the following factors to ensure they are not causing your site to load at a snail’s pace: Spikes in traffic – too many people trying to access the site at once will definitely cause a slow-down. Sharing server space if your site is hosted somewhere and you share server space with a busier, more active site, it can cause your site to be slower. It is advised to hire private server space to prevent this from happening. The total number of the HTTP requests your site receives. If you are trying to boost your traffic and maintain a healthy following of regular visitors, make sure you are NOT making the mistakes that lead to people hating your website. Even though they might not seem like a big deal, even the smallest mistakes can lead to low traffic, low conversion rates, and low bottom line results. At the end of the day, if you want to have a strong and prevalent online presence, no matter what sort of website you have, make sure you are doing everything in your power to ensure yours is mistake free. Giving your visitors a pleasant experience will not only have them coming back for more (and telling their friends when they share your site on their social networks), but your webpage will not be known amongst the worst on the Internet. This will only happen if you avoid the twenty things people hate about websites, so plan and execute your web strategy carefully! Your site’s survival on the Internet depends on it!