Professional web design is almost as complex as a small town. You have to think about mobility, design, functionality, and usability. You ensure mobile accessibility, aesthetics, usability, SEO and so much more.
The success of a website stands or falls with responsive web designing. Unfortunately, many website owners realize too late how many mistakes one can make when creating a website — and how costly those mistakes can become later.
The placement of a button or the color of the font can increase the user’s attention from 2% to 5%. In the example below, we’ve realigned the color and placement of the button (Call To Actions), more than doubling the visibility of the button!
Mistake #1: Flash, sliders, animations instead of a clear “conversion design”.
In the 1990s and early 2000s, the use of animation and Flash on websites was common. It was a way to spice up websites and grab attention.
Unfortunately, these tactics have been overused and are now passé.
Flash should generally be avoided. And animated images also have little space on a professional website.
Use such tactics very sparingly and only when absolutely necessary. Otherwise, it will only slow down your site and annoy your visitors.
Think carefully about whether and how animation actually helps your visitors.
- Can you explain more complex themes more easily with a short animation?
- Can you draw your visitors’ attention better thanks to a scroll-dependent animation?
Great. That’s where animations make sense.
If you just want to have “more movement” on the website, check whether this “more distraction” is really effective!
In this context, the question always arose as to whether a slider makes sense or not. In fact, sliders are problematic. Either the individual slides run too fast so that the customer cannot grasp the message correctly, or they run too slowly so that the customer no longer grasps the second and third messages at all. In both cases, instead of correctly communicating our message, we only significantly slowed down the website.
Alternatively, one could think about a hero image with a CTA, which only transports one message – but it does so correctly.
Mistake #2: Poorly chosen colors.
A big mistake people often make in web design is color choice: of course, everyone has their favorite colors. But these colors don’t necessarily have to be the best choice for the website. Often the colors don’t match or don’t work in combination.
For example, McDonald’s has always used the color red in its restaurants because the color makes people feel hungrier. As a result, individuals order more meals than they ought to because they misjudge their level of hunger.
Mistake #3: Wrong font.
You can basically create any design. About taste cannot be argued. But if you want to create a professional web design, you have to pay attention to the fonts! Unfortunately, most people are careless with fonts – and like to use the “wrong” fonts at times.
The more complex a font is, the harder it is to read.
And if nobody reads your texts, well… then nobody will buy your products either.
Big brands are using “clean fonts” for a reason: they don’t want to lose their customers just because their customers find it “too exhausting” to consume the content.
Some designers are obsessed with type. You have e.g. T. Thousands of fonts on their system and they would like to use as many fonts as possible in each of their designs.
Mistake #4: Failure to implement SEO.
Every single website on the planet requires search engine traffic. Why build a website if you don’t want it to be found?
But unfortunately, many focus solely on the way a website looks, forgetting the fact that the website is supposed to attract customers later on!
The world’s most beautiful website won’t help you if no one sees it!
Yes, your website should be attractive. And yes, your website should be user-friendly. But you should make sure that search engines can properly find and index your content. This requires the use of a suitable silo structure. Make sure your navigation links are easy for search engines to find.
Too often I see websites that create great navigation with images and snazzy headers as PNGs.
But all this does not like Google.
If you really want to design your website like this, make sure it is readable for Google. Remember: Google can read words, but not images.
Responsive web designing also considers what the structure of the website should look like later. How is content structurally integrated in such a way that readers AND Google can find their way around easily?
Mistake #5: Is the website mobile-friendly/responsive?
Let’s be honest. Smartphones & Co are the future. As much as 90% of some website traffic is mobile these days. The classic personal computer is actually losing ground.
Most people use computers for writing documents and working, but when it comes to surfing, more and more people are using tablets and smartphones – because they can use them anywhere.
Since April 2015, mobile friendliness has been one of the factors Google uses to determine rankings. Unless your site is mobile-friendly, your rankings will likely drop unless all of your other ranking factors are just phenomenal.
If you use WordPress, you can make your site mobile-friendly by choosing a professional responsive theme. If you want to create your own website, you should use Google’s Search Console to find out which system your visitors are using and then serve these users with your website in the best possible way.
Also Read:How to Design a Website Step-By-Step Guide in 2022?