Nowadays, almost every business, big or small has a website. Having a website is a necessity, in order to create a long-term and effective online presence, as discussed in a previous blog post.
Your website is often where potential customers form their first impressions of your company and decide whether or not to contact you. But simply having a website is not enough. You need to avoid making website mistakes that will lead to less traffic, lost conversions, lost time and energy and ultimately reduced revenue.
Therefore you have to avoid making the following huge mistakes with your business website that make people leave and never come back…
Out of date content
Nothing will hurt your brand reputation more than having outdated content on your business website. Customers expect your website to contain the latest information about your products, services, and company. When it doesn’t have this, they may assume you’re not in business any longer, or simply aren’t innovative and ahead of the competition. Your website is your primary sales tool where you can engage potential customers, so try to commit to updating your website content regularly.
Not including a call to action
Once your customers are on your website, they await you to tell them what to do next. The most common website mistake of many businesses is the lack of clear calls to action. Your CTA is the gateway to your business. Tell your visitors what you want them to do once they are on your website. Do you want them to buy your product, contact you, or sign up for your newsletter?
The website is not mobile-friendly
Customers are increasingly going mobile, and the convenience of smartphones and tablets is creating a rise in mobile phone usage, so making your website mobile-friendly is an absolute must. Thus if you don’t have a mobile-friendly website, that is a lot of users that cannot view your site, and a lot of potential clients or customers that you will say goodbye to!
Mobile is where your customers are – so it’s also where you should be. That’s why, having a website that is not ready for mobile devices such as smart phones and tablets will harm your business.
Not proofreading your website content
Your company’s website and content directly reflect on your business as a whole. No matter how professional the writer of your website content is, there is always a chance that mistakes like spelling typos, grammatical errors, and incorrect usage of words can happen. Mistakes like these, no matter how small, convey carelessness and can make customers doubt your authenticity, reliability, and professionalism. Therefore, you should take proofreading as a habit so that to avoid falling in this trap.
Focusing on traffic instead of conversions
A big mistake you may do is having a site that is overly focused on traffic without attention to making conversions and sales.
No business can survive if everyone is a window shopper.
Having unprofessional design
Your business website projects your image to existing and prospective customers, so it should be professional, modern and trustworthy, with consistent design elements. An unprofessional design, and a poorly laid and cluttered website will make you look unprofessional and will turn make viewers quickly decide it’s not worth their time.
Poor website navigation
Navigation within your website should be extremely easy and effective, because no one wants to be digging around extensively for information that should be easily accessible. Consumers want a website that makes it easy for them to find what they are looking for. So Even if the website has a visually appealing and professional design, visitors can grow frustrated and leave over poor navigation. For example, crowded menus, too many items in your navigation, inaccurate navigation titles and elements that are too close to one another can make a viewer leave your website.
Broken links
Links are important and great. But if users try to click on your website’s links and they are broken, or they are redirected to other pages, it tells them that you haven’t updated your site in a while. This can derail all of your hard work and can be harmful because this makes a bad user experience and visitors might get frustrated and never return to your website.
Therefore, always try to keep track of all of the links on your site, and spend some time every few months making sure that they work, and removing or updating those that are broken.
Lack of contact information
Customers and clients need to get in touch with you easily. If a visitor has to search through your website for contact information, he or she will likely get frustrated and leave. Therefore, your “Contact Us” page should always be just one click away, or your information should be at the bottom of every page, so that it’s incredibly easy for people to contact you via your site.
Conclusion
Your business website is the most important part of your online presence, and it can be one of your biggest assets in your business if you do it right. Website mistakes can result in the loss of leads, prospects, and sales.
Do you remember other common mistakes that you have seen on business websites? Share your thoughts with us.