With more users than ever before, the internet has become a fundamental aspect of modern life. It allows us to do almost everything from shopping, to booking GP appointments, without needing to go outside.
Therefore, it has never been more important to ensure that your website provides users with an easy, efficient experience they won’t mind repeating. Below, we have outlined 5 of the most annoying website mistakes to avoid when designing a website:
Slow loading speed
With life being so fast-paced, people want to be able to access information as quickly and with as little hassle as possible. In fact, statistics have shown that 47% of online consumers expect a site to load within two seconds; leave users waiting too long for content, and they’re likely to give up and move on to one of your competitors. There are however, plenty of things that you can do to improve website loading speed (and conversions), including but not limited to: reducing the amount of code on your site, optimising images, and changing your hosting provider.
Unresponsive design
Responsive design plays a huge role in increasing returning visitors and website conversions. If your website is unresponsive (not optimised for mobile devices), you may already be putting your business on the back foot. With more people using their mobile phones or tablets to access the internet than ever before, it is therefore imperative that websites are designed and built responsively in order to ensure a stress-free user experience and retain customers. Search engines like Google, will also favour sites which are optimised for mobile devices, and sometimes won’t even list unresponsive websites in their search results, so optimisation really is key.
Complicated navigation
Users want to be able to access information and products as quickly and efficiently as possible. This means that the navigation of your website needs to work for them – it needs to make their life easier, and make their experience on your website one they’d be happy to repeat. If the navigation is too complicated, or unresponsive, people are more likely to get frustrated and in turn, less likely to carry out the action they intended to make i.e. enquiring about a service, or buying a product. By streamlining your navigation, you are simplifying the user journey, and making the user experience simple and engaging.
Automatic modals/popups
Pop ups that appear the moment you land on a site are a bit like those overzealous retail assistants who practically jump on you the moment you step foot in a shop. Of course good customer service is something we all appreciate, and have come to expect, but we don’t necessarily want it thrusted upon us when we’ve not yet had time to look at any of their products. When users visit a website, they usually don’t wish to be bombarded with pop ups advertising a mailing list, or offers that they’re potentially not interested in. They probably already have an idea of what they’re looking for, and they just want to get to that service or product as quickly as possible, without having to fight their way through pop up after pop up. There are however other ways to showcase your offers or encourage users to sign up to your mailing lists, that won’t annoy people. A good way to test which of your calls to action are the most effective is to run A/B tests, as these will allow you to see which are the most effective and therefore ultimately help to retain more of your visitors.
Autoplay multimedia
Having multimedia on your website (such as audio, and videos) can be a really good way to showcase your products or services, or in our case, client testimonials. However, if they’re not used in the right way, they can become more of an annoyance than a positive marketing tool. Nobody wants to be at work for example, and suddenly have music blaring from their computer because of one of the tabs they’ve opened. It’s a lot quicker to close a tab, than to find the offending material in order to cancel the sound. This means you’re essentially giving users a quick exit from your site, before they’ve even looked at any of your content. Make your multimedia optional to play, and you’re more likely to keep people on your website.
For more information on ways to improve your website’s user experience, please feel free to contact us and one of the team will be happy to help.